The purpose of this article is to provide a taxonomy of existing literature on the relationship between integrated reporting and business performance. Published research articles related to integrated reporting practices were collected from various reputed journals published by Springer, Taylor & Francis, JSTOR, Wiley, Elsevier, Sage, and Emerald. A total of 110 research articles were examined. After reviewing all the articles rigorously, we found that the study related to the assessment of integrated reporting practices was mostly concentrated in developed countries as compared to developing countries. The result differs in various cultural and economic contexts and there is no universally accepted direction of the relationship between integrated reporting and firm performance. We further found that there is some decline in research studies in recent years. This study contributes to the academic literature by providing a comprehensive analysis of the various types of studies that were undertaken so far in the area of Integrated reporting and firm performance.

In the context of the GCC, the adoption of integrated reporting (IR) remains limited, due in part to weak regulatory enforcement, a lack of awareness of the strategic benefits of IR, and a strong focus on short-term financial results. This limited reporting context presents a significant challenge for firms to credibly demonstrate their value to the market and attract potential investors, thus communicating long-term value. Given these limitations, this study considers how IR contributes to firm value, but also examines the mediating role that firm image (FI) plays in this relationship as a reputational construct representing stakeholder perspectives of a firm’s transparency and accountability. The research employs a quantitative methodology, analysing secondary data from corporate governance and integrated reports spanning 2017–2018 to 2022–2023. Findings indicate a positive and robust relationship between integrated reporting and the firm’s value, which was assessed using Tobin’s Q. The findings highlight the significant mediating role of firm image, illustrating how IR practices, via increased transparency, accountability, and sustainability, enhance firm value. This study provides significant insights for researchers, policymakers, and corporate managers, highlighting the strategic relevance of IR in the GCC region. The findings demonstrate that integrated reporting improves transparency, accountability, and sustainability, thereby assisting corporate managers in utilising IR to enhance firm image and facilitate value creation. Policymakers can utilise these insights to develop regulatory frameworks that promote integrated reporting practices, thereby enhancing transparency and sustainable growth within the corporate sector.

The objective of this manuscript is to review the existing literature regarding integrated reporting (IR), focusing on theories, factors influencing it and its outcomes, and the methodologies adopted. The review encompasses a total of 27 studies conducted between 2006 and 2023. Following the earlier studies, four significant steps, i.e., searching for relevant studies, applying inclusion/exclusion criteria, applying methodological review protocol and finally synthetizing the protocol has been used to collect the relevant studies. The findings of the present study indicate that the majority of previous studies have relied on quantitative research methods and secondary data sources. Moreover, only two studies Boshnak (2022) and Alyousef and Alsughayer (2021) have considered both financial and non financial disclosures which represent the features of IR. The findings of the present study also identified firm size, leverage, the degree of government ownership, the degree of family ownership, firm profitability, audit firm size, and firm age as the determinants of corporate social and environmental voluntary disclosure. Moreover, the finding also indicated that among all the theories that contribute to IR, only agency theory, resource based theory, legitimacy theory and stakeholder theory were mostly considered by the previous studies.

This study examines how corporate governance (CG) and integrated reporting (IR) are associated with firm value and whether IR moderates the relationship between CG and firm value. Based on the agency theory and signaling theory, the results show that CG leads to improved monitoring, accountability, and strategic management processes while IR creates an opportunity to increase market confidence through the provision of connected, transparent and decision-useful information. The study uses a panel dataset of 80 firms listed on the Saudi Stock Exchange during 2020–2025, comprising 480 firm–year observations; the inclusion of a one-year-lagged variable reduced the estimation sample to 400 observations. CG was measured using a composite index of seven governance indicators, while IR was measured using a 58-item binary disclosure index. For the empirical analysis, random-effects regression, fixed-effects regression, and two-step system GMM were employed. The results reveal that CG and IR are positively related to firm value. Importantly, IR positively moderates the relationship between CG and firm value. This study demonstrates that IR enhances the value implication of CG among Saudi-listed firms.