Sovereign ESG and corporate investment: New insights from the United Kingdom.

This paper examines the nexus between sovereign environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) issues and corporate investment decisions from a sustainable perspective. By utilising firm-level balance sheets data, country-level governance and policy uncertainty data, we find country governance has a significant positive effect on firm investment. Moreover, this paper shows that climate and migration policy uncertainty has a statistically and economically significant dampening impact on corporate investment, indicating that environmental and social prospect plays a key role in promoting business investment in the United Kingdom. In addition, the empirical evidence on the moderation analysis of corporate leverage suggests that superior environmental, social, and governance performance can help businesses relieve the burden of debt overhang on firm investment. These results provide several important implications on climate change with the objectives of the COP26 conference. • The nexus between sovereign environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues and corporate investment is examined. • Country governance has a significant positive effect on firm investment. • Climate and migration policy uncertainty has dampening impact on corporate investment • Superior environmental, social, and governance performance help businesses relieve the burden of debt overhang. • Several important implications on climate change regarding the objectives of the COP26 conference are provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]