Table 1 Measurement of the variables.
Variable | ACRONYM | Measurement |
|---|---|---|
Dependent variable: | ||
Long-term growth sales | LGS | Cumulative sales growth. |
Stock return volatility | SRV | It is measured as the annualised monthly standard deviation of a firm’s return series. |
Explanatory variables: | ||
Board gender diversity | BGD | The number of female members divided by the board size. |
Board nationality diversity | BND | Measured as the ratio of foreign nationals on board. |
Mediating variable: | ||
Financial sustainability: | FINS | Higgins’ model, which is given as \({SGR}\,\left( \% \right)={PM}* {AT}* {FL}* {ERR}\) Where SGR = sustainable growth rate, PM = profit margin (net income after tax/revenue), AT = assets turnover (revenue / total assets), FL = Financial leverage (total debt / total assets) and ERR = earnings retention rate (retained earnings / net income after tax) |
Audit committee experience | ACE | Number of audit committee members with accounting and finance qualifications over the total audit committee members. |
Control variables: | ||
Firm size | FS | The logarithms of the sampled companies’ total assets. |
Firm age | FA | Number of years a firm has been listed as an observation period. |
Leverage | LEV | Total debts over total assets. |
Profitability | ROA | Operating profits divided by total assets. |
Board independence | BI | Number of outside directors over board size. |
Family ownership | FO | The percentage of shares held by families. |
Government ownership | GO | It was measured as the number of equity shares the government holds over the total equity shares. |
