Risk Disclosure in UK Companies Annual Reports

This dissertation discusses the UK companies practices in disclosing risk-related information in their corporate annual reports. In particular, the paper attempts to see whether the volume of risk and risk management disclosures provided by companies in their annual reports have changed during the period from the year 2001 until the year 2005. The paper is also seeking to demonstrate if there is a correlation between the volume of risk disclosures provided by companies and the size of those companies. In addition, the research describes some interesting aspects of risk disclosure in companies annual reports depending on risk category. The analysis of the research results has shown that the overall volume of risk disclosures provided by sample companies increased during the analysed period, and there is some positive correlation between a companys size and the amount of risk disclosures it makes in its annual report. Besides, it has been found that financial risk represents the largest portion in the analysed annual reports, with regulatory and strategic risks being the least significant portions of total risk disclosure. It has been also noted during the analysis that one of the fast-growing risk categories is the environmental risk which is probably justified by intensification of regulatory requirements in the Corporate Social Responsibility issues