Abstract

CASTRO JUNIOR, Francisco Henrique Figueiredo de; CONCEICAO, Paula Meneghesso da  and  SANTOS, Débora Antunes. The relationship between the level of voluntary disclosure and the cost of equity capital in non-financial Brazilian companies. REAd. Rev. eletrôn. adm. (Porto Alegre) [online]. 2011, vol.17, n.3, pp. 617-635. ISSN 1413-2311.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1413-23112011000300002.

The main objective of this research is to examine empirically the existence of a significant relationship between the level of voluntary disclosure of information and the cost of equity capital of Brazilian non-financial companies. It is expected that a greater level of disclosure is related to a lower cost of capital by reducing the risk perceived by investors. In order to measure the level of voluntary disclosure of the companies, a questionnaire developed for this purpose was used. The cost of equity capital was obtained from publicly available information. A negative and significant relationship between the variables of interest was found, indicating that companies that disclose more information voluntarily has a lower cost of equity capital.

Keywords : Disclosure; cost of equity capital; corporate governance.