| f_error | Forecast error, measured as the difference between earnings per share forecast and earnings per share actual scaled by share price at the end of the fiscal year |
| Independent Variables |
| IR_release | Dummy variable equal to 1 if the company publishes the IR; and 0 otherwise |
| Cluster1 | Dummy variable equal to 1 if the company is located in one of the countries belonging to Cluster 1 (namely, France, Hong Kong, Japan, the United Kingdom and the USA); and 0 otherwise |
| Cluster2 | Dummy variable equal to 1 if the company is located in one of the countries belonging to Cluster 2 (namely, Australia, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, New Zealand and Switzerland); and 0 otherwise |
| Cluster3 | Dummy variable equal to 1 if the company is located in one of the countries belonging to Cluster 3 (namely, Brazil, China, Greece, Italy, Namibia, Republic of South Korea and Sri Lanka); and 0 otherwise |
| IR_release_Cluster1 | Interaction between IR_release and Cluster1 |
| IR_release_Cluster2 | Interaction between IR_release and Cluster2 |
| IR_release_Cluster3 | Interaction between IR_release and Cluster3 |
| Firm-level financial controls |
| ln_nana | Natural logarithm of the number of analysts following each company each year |
| l_eps_st | Natural logarithm of the earnings per share standard deviation |
| Lev | Leverage is the ratio of total debt to the sum of total debt and the book value of common shareholders’ equity |
| ROA | EBIT/total assets ratio |
| Firm-level disclosure controls |
| CSR_report | Dummy variable equal to 1 if the company issues a standalone CSR/sustainability report, and 0 otherwise |
| ESG_env | ESG disclosure indicator section environment |
| ESG_gov | ESG disclosure indicator section governance |
| ESG_soc | ESG disclosure indicator section social |
| IFRS | Dummy variable equal to 1 if the company issues the annual report according to the IFRS; 0 otherwise |
| IR_first | Dummy variable equal to 1 if the company in that year release the IR for the first time |
| Naics | Dummy variable equal to 1 for sensitive industries (mining, manufacturing and trade), and 0 otherwise |
| Firm-level corporate governance controls |
| BoardSize | Number of the board’s members |
| W | Proportion of women on board of directors |
| Nonex | Proportion of non-executive board members sitting in the board |
| Controlled | Dummy variable equal to 1 if the company is controlled by a concentrated ownership |
| Variables used for endogeneity test |
| antiself | Measure of the investor protection (Djankov et al., 2003) |
| ESG_linked_bonus | Dummy variable equal to 1 if the management receives a bonus based on ESG indicators |
| Size | Natural logarithm of the total assets |
| Disc | Measure of the level of disclosure requirements in security offerings (La Porta et al., 2006) |