Erste Group, Wienerberger and Vienna Insurance Group top the Austrian podium

By Caroline Becker, Lundquist

This year’s findings in the Austrian edition of the Webranking by Comprend research, conducted in collaboration with Lundquist, was published today in Horizont. This year, the research covered the performance of the 20 largest Austrian listed companies, and the findings show growth on the part of the Austrian companies in many areas of the research. This was especially true when it comes to communications regarding corporate sustainability, though in general their financial communications suffered.

This year’s findings in the Austrian edition of the Webranking by Comprend research, conducted in collaboration with Lundquist, was published today in Horizont. This year, the research covered the performance of the 20 largest Austrian listed companies, and the findings show growth on the part of the Austrian companies in many areas of the research. This was especially true when it comes to communications regarding corporate sustainability, though in general their financial communications suffered.

The strongest communicators of last year’s edition reaffirmed their place on the podium again this year. Erste Group takes first place on the podium again this year with (70.5/100 points), cementing its spot on the top of the podium. Vienna Insurance Group, conceding its position at second place on the podium to Wienerberger (68.1/100 points), fell to third place with 65.9 points.

Though Austria historically has always maintained an impressive average in comparison to other country averages, this year it saw a slight decrease, by 0.2 points, due in parte to the increase of companies evaluated - the sample size was increased to 20 companies (up from 15 in 2017).

Austrian companies improve sustainability communications, but are worse off communicating with investors

We saw interesting improvements made in the areas of Sustainability and Careers this year among the companies evaluated in the research. These improvements highlighted a shift in focus toward increased communications with stakeholders, and is most likely due to the application of the new European Union legislation mandating greater transparency in non-financial performance. On the otherhand, communications to investors (sections The Share, IR and Governance) seem to have suffered: decreasing by 8%, 7% and 4% respectively.

How do the Austrians stack up in the European ranking?

Of the 20 companies we evaluated this year, 6 were also included in the Europe 500 ranking, which evaluates Europe’s 500 largest companies in the STOXX All Europe list. Among the companies evaluated are Erste Group, OMV Group, Voestalpine, Raiffeisen Bank International, Andritz, and Buwog, though only one of these six is able to break into the top 30 positions in the Europe 500 ranking. The six companies included in this edition scored an impressive average of 53.7 points in the ranking, moving up from last year and surpassing  the overall European average of 47.2 points for another year.

Austria top 10

See the full Austrian results