Digital mergers and acquisitions (M&As) are increasingly becoming a critical strategic approach for enterprises to advance digital transformation. This study conceptualizes digital M&As as positive shock events for corporate digital transformation. Using a dataset of digital M&As by Chinese listed companies from 2005 to 2024, this study applies the propensity score matching combined with difference-in-differences (PSM-DID) method to empirically examine the impact of digital M&As on the market value of acquiring firms. The results show that digital M&As significantly enhance acquirers’ market value. Mechanism tests reveal that this effect is driven by digital resource empowerment, operating through increased digital factor inputs and strengthened digital innovation capabilities. Heterogeneity analysis further indicates that the market value enhancement effect of digital M&As is predominantly significant in non-digital firms, non-state-owned enterprises, and firms located in eastern China. This study expands the research scope of the micro-level effects of the digital economy and offers useful references for the Chinese government in refining its digital economy strategies, as well as practical guidance for firms in formulating their own digital investment decisions.

The northwest region of China faces many practical challenges, and its digital economy lags behind other areas of China. Digital transformation is a new source of competitive advantage in the digital economy era, which can help northwest enterprises rebuild their competitive advantage in the digital age, accelerate the development of the digital economy in the northwest region, bridge the digital gap between the East and the West, and promote the high-quality development of the national digital economy. In this study, the PLS-SEM method is used to collect data from 172 enterprises across five provinces in northwest China, to deeply analyze the mechanism and path through which digital transformation reshapes enterprise competitive advantage, identify the key sticking point hindering digital transformation in northwest China, and then propose more targeted strategic suggestions. It is found that the resource base of enterprises in northwest China is generally weak, making it difficult to deliver direct competitive advantage; existing enterprise resources can provide basic conditions for digital transformation and resource-orchestration capability; although digital transformation cannot directly create competitive performance, it can indirectly deliver competitive advantage by positively affecting resource-orchestration capability; resource-orchestration capability directly and significantly affects enterprise competitive performance and is the core competency for enterprises to build digital resilience.

With the digital transformation of the capitalist economy, some contemporary scholars have put forward the Techno-Feudalism narrative of the digital economy. This narrative emphasizes that digital platform enterprises, as emerging market entities in the digital economy, have many practices that are highly similar to those of feudal lords. For example, digital platform enterprises plundering user data is similar to feudal lords plundering land; digital platform enterprises collecting digital rent is similar to feudal lords collecting land rent; digital platform enterprises controlling users and workers is similar to feudal lords controlling slaves. However, this narrative has many theoretical fallacies. Marx's theory of surplus value shows that the above phenomena are essentially still the contemporary form of capital seizing surplus value through technological innovation. The techno-feudalism narrative ignores the internal logic of capital using technological iteration to reconstruct the exploitation mechanism and falls into a superficial misjudgment. In contrast, the Chinese governance practice of digital economy breaks the monopoly of platforms on data elements through the innovation of the separation of three rights of data property rights; promotes fair competition and optimal allocation of resources in the digital economy by strengthening anti-monopoly supervision and promoting the construction of digital infrastructure; proves that the socialist system can break the capital proliferation cycle and achieve "people-centered" development by building a labor rights protection system to promote the creation and sharing of value and transcending the techno-feudalism phenomenon of the digital economy.

Enterprise digital transformation has become an inevitable trend in the digital economy era that can significantly impact enterprises. This paper takes the data of A-share listed companies from 2006 to 2022 as a sample to explore the effect of enterprise digital transformation on listed companies' corporate social responsibility and the mechanism of its role. It was found that corporate digital transformation can significantly enhance Csr(Corporate social responsibility), and enterprise digital transformation has a noticeable enabling effect on Csr, which can dramatically improve Csr. The relationship between the two still holds after the robustness test. It has been found that digital transformation can affect Csr by enhancing the green innovation capability of enterprises, the fairness of internal compensation distribution, and the sustainable development capability of enterprises. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that corporate digital transformation's impact on Csr fulfillment performance is more significant for non-state-owned firms and firms in the central and eastern regions. In addition, corporate financing constraints and government innovation subsidies influence Csr.

In this study, we investigate the impact of the development of the digital economy on corporate innovation and value using data of listed firms in China spanning the years 2011 to 2018. Our findings reveal a positive correlation between the development of the digital economy and corporate innovative activities, with a more pronounced effect observed in growth-stage firms, labor-intensive enterprises, and companies situated in underdeveloped regions. To establish a causal relationship, we employ a quasi-experimental approach utilizing the "Broadband China" pilot program. Using a difference-in-difference framework, we establish a causal link between the advancement of the digital economy and the increased innovative activities. Furthermore, our research underscores that digital economy development enhances firm value by promoting innovative activities. These results support the view that the digital economy plays a pivotal role in increasing firm value and fostering sustainable development in the overall economy.

This study investigates the effect of government digital attention on firm digital innovation. Using data from Chinese listed firms over 2012–2020, we find government digital attention can significantly propel the improvement of firms' digital innovation levels, primarily driving an increase in the quantity of digital innovations rather than a qualitative enhancement. Further analysis indicates that government attention achieves this impact by elevating the regional digital infrastructure, increasing firms' digital subsidies, alleviating firms' financing constraints, encouraging firms to intensify R&D investment, fostering a positive attitude towards digital transformation, and consequently, boosting the overall level of firms' digital innovation.

In order to clarify the effect and mechanism of servitization level and digital transformation on the performance of listed sporting goods manufacturing enterprises in China, the index of the degree of digital transformation is constructed based on the data of 31 sporting goods manufacturing enterprises listed on Shanghai and Shenzhen A shares and the New OTC Market in China, taking the proportion of service business income in enterprise operating income as the index of servitization level, by analyzing the semantic expression of national policy related to digital economy and collecting "digital" category keywords in enterprise annual report with the help of crawler technology, then, the influence of servitization level and digital transformation on enterprise performance is discussed, and whether digital transformation plays a moderating effect between servitization and enterprise performance is tested. The results show that the servitization level suppresses the performance of listed sporting goods manufacturing enterprises, and there is a "Servitization Paradox" phenomenon. The degree of digital transformation has a positive U-shaped impact on enterprise performance, and at the same time, digital transformation has a weak positive moderating effect on servitization level and enterprise performance.

In the context of promoting high-quality economic development, using digital technology to empower industrial transformation and upgrading, thus driving consumption growth has become a key problem that needs to be solved urgently. By using data at the prefecture-level cities in China from 2011 to 2020, the paper has discussed the influence of the digital economy on residents' consumption and its internal mechanism. Theoretical analysis and empirical test results have shown that first of all, the digital economy has significantly improved residents' consumption, and this conclusion is still valid after the endogenous test and robustness test. Secondly, mechanism analysis has shown that the digital economy can increase residents' consumption by promoting the upgrading of the industrial structure. Thirdly, the promotion effect of the digital economy on residents' consumption is heterogeneous between urban and rural areas and between different regions. Compared with urban, and eastern and central regions, the digital economy has a more significant incentive for residents' consumption in rural areas and western regions, indicating that its development is beneficial to narrowing the gap of consumption between urban and rural areas and between regions. Finally, the improvement effect of the digital economy on residents' consumption has marginal increment nonlinear characteristics, which is continuously strengthened with the upgrading of industrial structure. The above research conclusions can provide a theoretical basis for further improving the infrastructure of the digital economy, accelerating the integration of the digital economy with traditional industries, and building a consumer Internet.

Digital economy promotes the modernization of industrial structure by influencing the rationalization and upgrading of industrial structure through technical level and factor level; while excessive credit expansion hinders the modernization of industrial structure. This paper uses panel data from 31 jurisdictions in China to conduct empirical analysis, and finds that digital economy development shows a year-on-year rising trend, and there is a large gap between different regions. The conclusion still holds after the robustness test and regional heterogeneity analysis, thus enriching the understanding of mechanisms and regional differentiation of digital economy, credit expansion on industrial structure modernization.

This study examines whether and how minimum wage hikes affect workers’ strikes in the context of China. We show that minimum wage significantly increases strikes at the city-level, and this effect is mainly motivated by demands for unpaid wages and severance pay. Mechanism analysis reveals that workers’ strikes are caused by inevitable involuntary unemployment arising from wage hikes. In addition, the increase in workers’ strike activities is more significant in tertiary industries, which require a larger share of low-wage workers and in regions with a higher degree of digital economy and innovation. Our findings provide clear policy implications for policymakers concerned with minimum wage and unemployment.