Digital transformation (DT) is an ongoing and costly process that requires careful planning and the motivation of top executives (CEOs). This research analyze the CEOs compensation as a motivation to embrace DT by reducing agency issue. We determine the extent of DT through a textual analysis method and utilize data from Chinese publicly traded companies spanning the period between 2007 and 2020. Our study findings are threefold, (a) we observe a positive relationship between CEOs' pay gap and DT, highlighting the significant role CEOs compensation plays in encouraging CEOs to adopt digitalization, (b) we find that managerial shareholding significantly enhances this relationship, (c) we note that the relationship between CEOs pay gap and DT is more pronounced in state-owned enterprises compared to non-stateowned enterprises. Additionally, we discover through channel analysis that agency cost and audit quality mediate the relationship between CEOs pay gap and DT potentially by reducing the agency problem between CEOs and shareholders. These findings are vital for comprehending the pay practices and behaviors of corporate executives regarding digitalization in China. Importantly, the study results remain robust when considering instrumental variables (IV), propensity score matching (PSM), and alternative techniques.

This study investigates how digital transformation affects public sentiment toward firms on social media platforms in China. Using 2008-2022 data on Chinese listed companies and multivariate regression analysis, this paper identifies that digital transformation boosts positive online comments and sentiment. This relationship is mediated by gains in total factor productivity from digital initiatives. Moreover, concurrent green transformation positively moderates the effect, amplifying the impact of digital moves on online positive sentiment. Heterogeneous results reveal that the digital transformation effect on online positive sentiment is greater for state-owned, high-tech, and large companies. To our knowledge, this is the pioneering study to examine the linkage between corporate digital transformation and online public sentiment. The findings reveal whether, how, and when digital transformation shape more favorable public sentiment and online buzz. Companies can leverage digitalization, productivity improvements, and green development to foster positive perceptions and enhance their online reputation.

Many studies suggest a positive and monotonic relationship between technological progress and wage income inequality since 1980s for industrialized economies. We examine this topic in the context of the Chinese economy where new technologies like automation, AI and digitalization have witnessed worldís most rapid growth in the last decade. Surprsingly, we Önd an inverted U-Shaped relationship - a "Digital Kuznets Curve", using a panel dataset constructed in line with the newly published "2021 Categorization of Core Industries of Digital Economy". We then set out a task-based growth model with heterogenous human capital and occupational choice, and show that this hump-shaped relationship can emerge either by introducing an erosion e§ect of digitalization on worker ability that increasingly counterveils the skill-biasing e§ect, or by directly adding a dynamic learning cost that captures the externality of digitalization. Our study contributes to the understanding of the nature of digitalization in re-shaping labor market structure.

Audit digitalization is the organic integration of digital technology and audit work; Internal audit digital intelligence is a collective term for internal audit digitalization and internal audit intelligence. This paper systematically expounds that the digital transformation of audit is conducive to achieving internal audit goals, giving full play to the internal audit function, and improving the efficiency of internal audit. The main paths and key points of the digital transformation of enterprise audit are introduced, and it is pointed out that intelligent audit is a major trend in the future development of auditing. The three types of intelligent audit and the application of digital twin in commercial bank audit are introduced. A brief introduction to Bank of Jiangsu's research-based audit and its achievements. It is pointed out that the digital transformation of audit is also the upgrading and transformation of organizations and talents, and it is necessary to vigorously cultivate and introduce audit professionals to support the smooth achievement of digital transformation of auditing.

The improvement of production efficiency and changes in business models brought about by the deep integration of the digital economy and the real economy have become an important driving force for industrial transformation and upgrading. This paper expounds the necessity of digital transformation of manufacturing industry and its path selection. The important role of industrial Internet and Internet platforms is pointed out, and the characteristics of industrial Internet platforms such as Midea Group and Siemens MindSphere and their effects on industrial transformation are analyzed. Enterprises should vigorously promote the deep integration of big data, the Internet, cloud computing, the Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, blockchain and the real economy, accelerate the digital transformation of the manufacturing industry, and inject new impetus into the high-quality development of the manufacturing industry.

Over the past decade, the rapidly digitizing economy in China has attracted much attention in both academic and policy circles. Most existing studies focus on the positive impact digitalization has had on China's inclusive growth. Few of them have attempted to measure the widening digital divide and its potential impact. Using the 2017 and 2019 China Household Finance Survey (CHFS) data, this paper: (i) provides the first evidence that the digital divide has a significant negative impact on household consumption. For every unit increase in the digital divide, the level of household consumption will drop by about 28 percent; (ii) finds the negative impact stems from an integrated channel of rising unemployment, intensified liquidity constraints, and declining financial literacy; and (iii) further discloses that the digital divide has differential impacts on household consumption by category, while hinders consumption diversification. The results are robust to correcting for potential endogeneity due to sample selection, household heterogeneity, and reverse causality. Our findings shed new light on some little-documented evidence and have profound implications for related socio-economic policies that fully utilize technology to drive efficiency and inclusivity in the digital economy.

Exploiting staggered COVID-19 lockdowns and reopening across different regions in China, we study how lockdowns affect the investment decisions of venture capital (VC) investors and whether such changes are temporary or enduring in the post-pandemic era. Contrary to the conventional wisdom that lockdowns exacerbate the “tyranny of distance” (i.e., VCs avoid investing in remote ventures), our findings suggest the “death of distance”: VCs invest in remoter ventures during a lockdown and such effects persist even after the economy reopens. Such lockdown effects are more pronounced when there is better internet infrastructure, when the level of information asymmetry between VCs and entrepreneurs is lower, and when VCs are more experienced. The lockdown effects can be explained by the advancement and adoption of remote communication technology as a response to the social distancing requirements. As geographic boundaries of VC investment are shattered by remote communication technology, local competition among VCs has been intensified, the monopoly power of VCs has been curtailed, and the regional inequality of entrepreneurial access to VC financing has been mitigated.

Over the past 150 years, finance has evolved into one of the world’s most globalized, digitized and regulated industries. Digitalization has transformed finance but also enabled new entrants over the past decade in the form of technology companies, especially FinTechs and BigTechs. As a highly digitized industry, incumbents and new entrants are increasingly pursuing similar approaches and models, focusing on the economies of scope and scale typical of finance and the network effects typical of data, with the predictable result of the emergence of increasingly large digital finance platforms. We argue that the combination of digitization, new entrants (especially BigTechs) and platformization of finance – which we describe as FinTech 4.0 and mark as beginning in 2019-2020 – brings massive benefits and an increasing range of risks to broader sustainable development. The platformization of finance poses challenges for societies and regulators around the world, apparent most clearly to date in the US and China. Existing regulatory frameworks for finance, competition, data, and technology are not designed to comprehensively address the challenges to these trends to broader sustainable development. We need to build new approaches domestically and internationally to maximize the benefits of network effects and economies of scope and scale in digital finance while monitoring and controlling the attendant risks of platformization of finance across the existing regulatory silos. We argue for a principles-based approach that brings together regulators responsible for different sectors and functions, regulating both on a functional activities based approach but also – as scale and interconnectedness increase – addressing specific entities as they emerge: a graduated proportional hybrid approach, appropriate both domestically in the US, China and elsewhere, as well as for cross-border groups, building on experiences of supervisory colleges and lead supervision developed for Globally Systemically Important Financial Institutions (G-SIFIs) and Financial Market Infrastructures (FMIs). This will need to be combined with an appropriate strategic approach to data in finance, to enable the maximization of data benefits while constraining related risks.