This paper explores how green digital technologies (GDTs)—ERP systems, cloud software, IoT, artificial intelligence, and big data analytics—can be used to improve the quality of ESG disclosures of industrial listed companies in the Amman Stock Exchange (ASE). Based on the institutional isomorphism theory, we examine how the relationship between coercive, mimetic, and normative institutional pressures and adopting green technology interacts to effect sustainability reporting practices. Using panel data pertaining to 30 ASE-listed industrial companies during the 2020–2024 period (N = 146 firm-year observations), we applied pooled OLS and random effects frameworks characterized by a strong clustering of standard errors. The findings show that the Green Digital Technology Index is positively and significantly associated with ESG disclosure scores (Pooled OLS: β = 5.448, t = 2.367, p = 0.019; Random Effects: β = 5.941, t = 2.507, p = 0.024), with adopting firms having an average score that is 1.73 points higher. Its largest effect is on the environmental dimension (β = 3.460, p = 0.074). Institutional pressures do not moderate the GDT–disclosure relationship; however, mediation analysis indicated that institutional pressure significantly predicts GDT adoption (β = 0.098, p < 0.001), suggesting that institutional forces are linked to disclosure quality through their association with technology adoption rather than through direct effects, indicating that institutional forces exert their influence through technology adoption. Disclosure quality is negatively associated with CEO duality (β = −4.863, p < 0.001). These results are consistent with the interpretation that green digital technologies serve as a transmission channel through which institutional pressures are associated with enhanced sustainability disclosure in emerging markets.

Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) ratings are now central to how firms’ sustainability is assessed, yet leading providers disagree sharply, injecting measurement error and uncertainty into any rating-based decision. This study proposes and applies a transparent, fully reproducible alternative for the environmental pillar: an ordinal, sector-based carbon-exposure measure constructed solely from firms’ publicly observable industry classifications, free of vendor scoring choices and reconstructable at zero cost. The measure captures structural, between-sector carbon exposure; it is not a firm-level environmental-performance score and does not use reported emissions. Using 3067 firm-year observations on 1049 listed non-financial firms that carry an observed sector classification across six developed markets (the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, France, Italy, and Spain) over fiscal 2021–2025 (with a small number of early fiscal-2026 period-ends), we assess the measure’s informativeness by estimating its association with accounting profitability in high-dimensional fixed-effects models. Descriptively, more carbon-intensive sectors are less profitable (a monotone brown tilt), but this association is not robust: once firm controls and country-by-year fixed effects are absorbed, carbon exposure is not significantly related to return on assets, return on equity, or net margin, and there is no evidence of a concave (inverted-U) pattern. The measure does recover a real operating difference, higher asset turnover among carbon-intensive sectors, but this is offset by margins and does not translate into a profitability premium. A within-firm design detects no differential effect of mandatory non-financial reporting. The contribution is a transparent, rule-based environmental measure that sidesteps rating divergence; the honestly reported null on profitability cautions that apparent effects are sensitive to sample construction and sectoral composition, and positions the measure as a complement to, rather than a substitute for, proprietary ESG ratings.

The paper explores how Green digital technologies (GDTs) - ERP systems, cloud, IoT, artificial intelligence, and big data analytics can be used to improve the quality of ESG disclosures of industrial listed companies in the Amman Stock Exchange (ASE). On the basis of institutional isomorphism theory, we examine the relationship between the coercive, mimetic and normative institutional pressures and adoption of green technology interaction on the sustainability reporting practices. On the basis of panel data of 30 ASE-listed industrial companies during the period of 20202024 (N = 146 firm-year observations), we use pooled OLS and random-effects frameworks characterized by strong clustering of standard errors. Findings show that Green Digital Technology Index has a positive and significant agreement with the ESG disclosure scores (0.019; 0.024; 2.486, p value 0.019; 2.507, p value 0.024), with adopting firms having an average score of 1.73 higher. Its impact has been the most significant to the environmental aspect ( = 3.460, 0.074) = 0.074. Although institutional pressures fail to modulate the GDT-disclosure relationship, mediation analysis shows that institutional pressure is also a powerful predictor of GDT adoption (0.098, p 0.100), indicating that institutional forces play the role through technology adoption. The quality of disclosure has a negative relationship with CEO duality ( -4.863, p < 0.001). The results validate the assumption that the green digital technologies are a transmission mechanism where institutional pressures are converted to an enhancement of sustainability disclosure in the emerging markets.

Does mandatory sustainability disclosure improve the quality of corporate financial reporting immediately, gradually, or with delay? We address this question using Saudi Arabia’s January 2021 Tadawul ESG Disclosure Guidelines—the first comprehensive sustainability disclosure framework in the Gulf Cooperation Council and a uniform, accurately dated regulatory shock affecting all listed firms. Using a balanced panel of 135 non-financial firms over 2017–2024 (1080 firm-year observations), we estimate absolute discretionary accruals from the Modified Jones Model and employ event-time fixed-effects regressions with Driscoll–Kraay standard errors robust to heteroskedasticity, autocorrelation, and cross-sectional dependence. We document a temporal paradox: reporting quality did not change in the announcement year (2021), deteriorated significantly in 2022 (+28%) and 2023 (+38%) relative to the pre-reform baseline, and then improved significantly in 2024 (−17%). The pattern survives performance-matched discretionary accruals, exclusion of the 2020 COVID-19 year, a placebo test, sectoral disaggregation across nine Tadawul-aligned industry groups, and a battery of pre-reform firm characteristics. Heterogeneity analysis identifies the underlying mechanism: voluntary pre-2021 ESG disclosers and firms with stronger pre-reform governance exhibit amplified short-run deterioration, while larger firms with pre-existing reporting infrastructure show a substantially attenuated paradox. These patterns are jointly consistent with the adjustment-cost mechanism we develop: the reform redirected scarce reporting governance toward the new disclosure margin during a three-year compliance buildout, after which the constraining effect on accrual-based earnings management emerged. The findings carry direct implications for the design and evaluation of mandatory sustainability disclosure reforms currently advancing across emerging and developed markets.

Climate action is an alarming issue, and the world is concerned about sustainable solutions. Governance quality, financial technology and advanced-resource endowments have a pivotal role in climate action, yet the literature lacks evidence on their linkages with carbon emissions. The present study covers this gap in the literature for the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, as they offer an ideal study setting given their extreme vulnerability to climate change, their reliance on fossil fuels, the strong efforts to address climate change issues, and their prioritization of transforming the financial sector through financial technology as a means of resolving climate issues. Results show that governance quality and financial technology curb carbon emissions. Specifically, financial technology reduces CO₂ emissions by approximately 36.4% in the FMOLS estimation, while governance quality contributes negatively and significantly to CO₂ emissions across most specifications. Further, the interaction term of financial technology and advanced-resource endowments is statistically significant with a negative coefficient, hereby providing a supportive role in reducing CO₂ emissions. Hence, advanced-resource endowments play a moderating role, transforming the effectiveness of financial technology in reducing carbon emissions. The findings are robust for quantile regressions and alternative measures of environmental degradation and have strong policy implications for the Gulf Cooperation Council countries.