Triple Bottom Line Reporting and Shareholders' Value of Listed Oil and Gas Firms, Nigeria

The increased cases of environmental abuse caused by business activities have led the government to put in place environmental policies aimed at preventing possible destruction of the environment going forward. This study therefore examined the effect of triple bottom line reporting on shareholders’ wealth maximisation in listed oil and gas firms in Nigeria. This study adopted ex-post facto research design. The population of the study comprises 12 oil and gas firms listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange. The purposive sampling technique was employed to select 10 firms to form the sample size of the study. Data were collected from secondary sources using the annual reports of the selected firms from 2013 to 2021. The results showed that the proxies for environmental reporting-; environmental protection expenditure (co-efficient of 6.29 with p-value of 0.6848), conservation of energy consumption (co-efficient of 5.98 with p-value of 0.5882), water recycled and reused (co-efficient of 3.63 with p-value of 0.3480) are significant to shareholders’ wealth. It was also revealed that economic reporting proxies such as earning per share (co-efficient of 0.0065 with a p-value of 0.6065), return on equity (co-efficient of 0.0321 with a p-value of 0.0124), and return on asset (co-efficient of 0.1693 with a p-value of 0.1533) were significant to shareholders’ wealth. Staff training and development (co-efficient of 1.70 with a p-value of 0.2089); local community development (co-efficient of 1.35 with a p-value of 0.2641) and; prevention against work hazards (co-efficient of 1.81 with a p-value 0.5413), which were proxies for social responsibility reporting, were significant to shareholders’ wealth maximisation. The study concluded that triple bottom line reporting has a significant influence on shareholders’ wealth and recommended that the management of oil and gas firms invest more in ventures that will enhance the image of the firms in society and the environment to promote shareholders’ wealth.