We study tail-risk contagion in Belt and Road (BRI) stock markets by conditioning on shocks from China and global commodities. We construct time-varying contagion indices from conditional higher co-moments (CoHCM) estimated within a DCC-GARCH model with generalized hyperbolic innovations, and apply them to daily data for 32 BRI markets. The higher-moment index isolates two channels: a China-driven financial-institutional channel and a WTI-driven commodity-real-economy channel, whereas a covariance benchmark fails to recover this separation. Furthermore, the system-GMM estimates link the China-conditional channel to institutional quality and financial depth, and the WTI-conditional channel to real activity. In out-of-sample portfolio tests, the WTI-conditional signal improves risk-adjusted performance relative to equally weighted and mean-variance benchmarks, while the China-conditional signal does not. Tail-based measurement thus sharpens identification of contagion paths and yields information that is economically relevant for risk management in interconnected emerging markets.

We investigate whether a firm’s decision on green bond issuances is influenced by the green bond issuances by other firms in the same industry. We find that a firm is significantly more likely to issue green bonds after observing that other firms in the same industry have previously issued green bonds. This effect cannot be explained by the issuer’s supplement to their previous issuances, incentive policies, and industry competition. Furthermore, we show that issuing green bonds can bring significant positive stock excess returns, which increases the motivation for institutional investors to learn and drive other firms in the same industry they hold to issue green bonds. Our findings indicate that the peer effect can be driven by social learning of the common ownership among firms and explain the reason for the rapid increase in green bond issuance.

The commodity and financial characteristics of carbon emission allowances play a pivotal role within the Carbon Emission Trading Scheme (CETS). Evaluating the effectiveness of the scheme from the perspective of carbon price is critical, as it directly reflects the underlying value of carbon allowances. This study employs a time-varying Difference-in-Differences (DID) model, utilizing data from publicly listed enterprises in China over the period from 2010 to 2023, to examine the effects of carbon price level and stability on Total Factor Productivity (TFP). The results suggest that both an increase in carbon price level and stability contribute to improvements in TFP, particularly for heavy-polluting and non-stateowned enterprises. Mechanism analysis reveals that higher carbon prices and stability can stimulate corporate engagement in green innovation, activate the Porter effect, and subsequently enhance TFP. Furthermore, optimizing the system environment proves to be an effective means of strengthening the scheme's impact. The study also finds that allocating initial quotas via payment-based mechanisms offers a more effective design. This research highlights the importance of strengthening the financial attributes of carbon emission allowances and offers practical recommendations for increasing the activity of trading entities and improving market liquidity.

The role of institutional investors in the development of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) criteria lacks consensus in the academic community. This study utilizes a quasi-natural experiment involving Chinese mutual funds that have signed the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment (UNPRI) to investigate whether institutional Investors’ ESG investment commitments can significantly reduce ESG rating disagreement among the companies in their portfolios. We first find that companies held by ESG commitment institutional Investors exhibit less disagreement in ESG rating compared to those held by Non-ESG commitment institutional Investors. we then show that institutional Investor’ ESG investment commitment influence ESG rating disagreement by enhancing the quality of ESG disclosure and attracting external ESG attention. We further discover that institutional investors’ ESG investment commitments significantly mitigates the ESG rating disagreement among domestic ESG rating agencies and firms with a higher level of corporate governance.

Environmental disclosure in emerging markets remains poorly understood, despite its critical role in sustainability governance. Here, we analyze 42,129 firm-year environmental disclosures from 4,571 Chinese listed firms (2008-2022) using machine learning techniques to characterize disclosure patterns and regulatory responses. We show that increased disclosure volume primarily comprises boilerplate content rather than material information. Cross-sectional analyses reveal systematic variations across industries, with manufacturing and high-pollution sectors exhibiting more comprehensive disclosures than consumer and technology sectors. Notably, regional rankings in environmental disclosure volume do not align with local economic development levels. Through examination of staggered regulatory implementation, we demonstrate that market-based mechanisms generate more substantive disclosures compared to command-and-control approaches. These results provide empirical evidence that firms strategically manage environmental disclosures in response to institutional pressures. Our findings have important implications for regulatory design in emerging markets and advance understanding of voluntary disclosure mechanisms in sustainability governance.

This study investigates the "stars effect" of recruiting overseas scholars as deans and its impact on academic output in China from 2001-2019. We find that appointing a returnee dean increases a department's English publications by 40% annually. This positive effect applies to both top-tier and non-top-tier journals, without crowding out Chinese publications. The magnitude of the effect correlates with the dean's international connections and the ranks of the destination and source institutions. Returnee deans enhance output through knowledge spillovers, expanded networks, and increased overseas personnel, but not additional research grants. Our findings demonstrate the positive role and extensive influence of power-granted talent initiatives in developing regions.

Existing literature has demonstrated the aggregation and allocation effects of the corporate holding financial institutions on financial resources, but there is little literature to discuss whether it will further affect corporate employment. Therefore, this paper uses data from China's A-share listed companies from 2010 to 2021 to examine whether holding financial institutions can affect corporate employment, thus serving the real economy. Empirical results show that holding financial institutions significantly expands corporate employment, which is pronounced in periods of tight monetary policy, in financially underdeveloped areas, and for enterprises with high financing constraints, weak external supervision, and high labor intensity. The conclusion still holds after conducting a series of robustness tests. Mechanism tests show that holding financial institutions can expand corporate employment by alleviating liquidity constraints and inhibiting the dissipation of internal funds caused by agency problems. Further discussion also shows that holding financial institutions has significantly improved corporate operating performance and increased the salary levels of executives and ordinary employees, which means that there is no “executive plunder” after profit increases; Meanwhile, holding financial institutions generates spillover effects along the supply chain, expanding corporate employment among major suppliers and customers. This paper has important implications for taking measures related to “finance serves for the real economy” to achieve high-quality economic development.

This paper investigates how institutional investors’ site visits affect firm productivity by using a dataset of China’s A-share listed firms. The findings reveal that site visits have a constructive effect on firm productivity. Moreover, mechanism analysis indicates that reducing information asymmetry and improving stock price informativeness are two channels through which site visits influence firm productivity. Heterogeneity analysis demonstrates that the nexus between site visits and firm productivity is more pronounced for non-state-owned firms and firms with intenser product market competition. Overall, this study brings new insights into the benefits of site visits and highlights the importance of investor activism.

This paper aims to clarify the relationship between key audit matters (KAMs) disclosure and corporate financialization. The findings reveal that key audit matters (KAMs) disclosure can provide incremental information value, thereby impeding corporate financialization in China. Moreover, this effect is more pronounced in the samples with low media attention, low shareholding of institutional investors, and non-state-owned enterprises. Further research indicates that reducing managerial myopia and easing financing constraints serve as key channels through which key audit matters (KAMs) disclosure affects corporate financialization. This study provides empirical evidence on efficiently preventing excessive financialization of enterprises, as well as some insights for mitigating systemic financial risks from the key audit matters (KAMs) disclosure perspective.

Previous studies on the impact of corporate information disclosure on stock price crash risk have largely focused on financial statements. In contrast, China’s unique monthly operating report disclosure system—featuring high frequency and realtime operational data—offers a distinct information channel. Using data from A-share listed firms from 2010 to 2021, we find that monthly operating report disclosures significantly reduce stock price crash risk by alleviating information asymmetry between firms and external stakeholders. The underlying mechanisms involve restraining managerial opportunism and correcting investor expectation biases. Further analysis shows that firms’ official responses to investor inquiries has no significant effect on crash risk once monthly operational disclosures are accounted for, underscoring that the quality of information disclosed is as important as its frequency. The risk-reducing effect is more pronounced among firms with greater business complexity, weaker internal controls, and lower institutional ownership.