Financing divestment from Russia

This paper examines the determinants of corporate divestment from Russia using a unique dataset of divestment decisions of firms operating in Russia. We find that larger firms with higher sales in Russia as well as higher cash reserves and leverage, are more likely to divest from Russia. Additionally, firms with high Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) scores and substantial advertising expenditures (for U.S. firms only) exhibit a greater propensity to exit the Russian market. Our causal evidence is economically important, with elasticities for Firm Size , Russian sales , Cash , Leverage , and Social ESG score at 2.413, 0.468, 0.352, 0.477, and 0.962 which indicates that a 1% increase in these variables increases the probability of exiting Russia by 2.431%, 0.468%, 0.352%, 0.477% and 0.962%, respectively.