In highly competitive product markets, firms can internalize other firms’ resources through interfirm collaboration. Using a longitudinal dataset on strategic alliances among private and public firms in Europe, this study examines how industry competition induced by international trade inflows affects the interfirm competitive and cooperative dynamics. We document that industry-level competition shocks, caused by Chinese import penetration, are a key driver in shaping corporate alliances. Notably, firms with constrained cash flow but ample cash reserves are more likely to form alliances in industries experiencing competition shocks. After these alliances, we observe improvements in cash flow growth and investment, with this positive impact of interfirm collaboration being more pronounced among private firms. These findings suggest that strategic alliances are crucial tools for restructuring following international trade inflows, particularly among small, private enterprises.

This paper examines how economic policy uncertainty (EPU) affects mergers and acquisitions (M&As) between companies with different levels of financing constraints. Existing literature overlooks the interactive effect of EPU and financing constraints on M&As, and empirical evidence regarding EPU's influence on financially constrained firms remains limited. China's unique ownership structure provides a valuable context for this analysis, as state-owned enterprises (SOEs) face fewer financing constraints than private firms. Using a 2007-2021 sample of Chinese listed state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and private companies, we find that high EPU decreases the likelihood of private firms acquiring SOEs, while increases the likelihood of private firms being acquired by SOEs. These results suggest that under high EPU, financially constrained firms experience greater survival pressure, limiting their capacity to alleviate constraints by acquiring less-constrained targets. Conversely, less-constrained firms enhance their bargaining power and are more likely to acquire financially stressed counterparts. EPU facilitates control transfers from high-constraint to low-constraint firms, contributing to long-term market returns and improving financial market allocation efficiency. Our study contributes to the literature by shedding light on how EPU shapes divergent M&A behaviors based on firms’ financing constraints.

We examine how Chinese mutual funds react to superstitious beliefs about bad luck during one’s zodiac year, which occurs on a 12-year cycle around a person’s birth year. Funds decrease their holdings of zodiac stocks, non-state-owned enterprises in the zodiac years of their chairperson, and profit more from trading zodiac stocks than from trading other stocks. This pattern is more pronounced in firms with lower investor awareness and higher liquidity, and for fund managers with higher past ability, indicating that fund managers trade in anticipation of the negative market reaction towards zodiac stocks.

This paper investigates how the geographical distribution of shareholders in Chinese mutual fund management companies influences investment decisions. We show that mutual funds are more inclined to hold and overweight stocks from regions where their shareholders are located, thus capitalizing on a local information advantage. By examining changes in fund holdings in response to shifts in the shareholder base, we rule out the possibility that these effects are driven by fund managers’ local biases. Our findings reveal that stocks from the same region as the fund’s shareholders tend to outperform and significantly contribute to the fund’s overall performance.

在中国式现代化和金融强国战略纵深推进的背景下，中国保险业正由以规模扩张为主导的发展模式，全面转向以质量提升、风险可控和价值创造为核心的高质量发展阶段。特别是2024年新一轮金融监管体制改革以及《加强监管防范风险推动保险业高质量发展的若干意见》（新“国十条”）出台后，保险业在服务国家战略、保障民生安全和防范系统性金融风险中的功能定位进一步强化。本文在国内国际双循环新发展格局下，系统界定保险业高质量发展的政治性、人民性与专业性内涵，构建“规模—结构—功能—效益”四维分析框架，基于“十四五”以来尤其是近两年行业最新数据与实践进展，分析我国保险业在服务实体经济、普惠保障、科技赋能和风险防控方面取得的阶段性成效，同时揭示产品同质化、服务信任不足、风险定价能力偏弱等突出问题。在此基础上，结合数字金融发展趋势与中国特色保险文化建设要求，从产品创新、服务升级、风险治理、监管优化和文化培育五个维度，提出推动我国保险业实现高质量、可持续发展的现实路径，为保险业由“保险大国”迈向“保险强国”提供具有现实针对性的政策建议。

刘阳

保险中介业作为保险市场的关键组成部分，在行业高速增长期通过“人海战术”实现了规模扩张，但粗放式发展累积了从业人员素质不均、销售误导等诸多问题。随着经济进入高质量发展阶段、监管政策趋严，行业经历代理人规模大幅缩减的“减量”转型，“高质量发展”成为核心命题。本文通过梳理相关研究，分析行业现状，指出其面临监管框架与市场创新适配不足、专业化人才短缺、科技应用失衡、生态协同匮乏等核心挑战。在此基础上，提出从监管框架重构升级、专业化与职业化深度重塑、数字技术全方位赋能、生态系统协同共生四个维度构建协同行动框架，推动行业从“规模红利”向“价值红利”跨越，助力其在社会保障体系完善与实体经济风险管理中发挥更重要作用。

In this paper, we investigate alternative one-factor and two-factor continuous-time models with both affine and non-affine variance dynamics for the Chinese options market. Through extensive empirical analysis of the option panel fit and diagnostics, we find that it is necessary to include both the non-affine feature and the multi-factor structure. For performance evaluation, we examine various measures from both aggregate and dynamic perspectives. Our results are statistically significant.

在人口老龄化加剧与劳动力跨区域流动常态化的双重背景下，城镇职工养老保险基金的区域失衡问题日益凸显。本文以2011-2023年我国京津冀与长三角的7个省级行政区的面板数据为研究样本，聚焦劳动力流动对城镇职工养老保险基金抚养比（DR）的影响机制，通过构建双向固定效应模型、滞后变量模型及交互项模型，系统检验劳动力流动的直接效应、区域异质性及全国统筹政策的调节效应。研究发现：劳动力流动和全国统筹政策对DR均存在显著正向影响；区域异质性表现为长三角地区劳动力流动对DR的影响显著强于京津冀地区。文章结论为优化养老保险基金区域调剂机制、制定差异化劳动力流动与社保政策提供实证支撑。

冯静仪