Does Digital Finance Improve Corporate ESG Performance? An Intermediary Role Based on Financing Constraints

Yuxin Ning () and Yihan Zhang
Additional contact information
Yuxin Ning: School of Economics and Management, Xi’an Shiyou University, Xi’an 710312, China
Yihan Zhang: School of Economics and Management, Xi’an Shiyou University, Xi’an 710312, China

Sustainability, 2023, vol. 15, issue 13, 1-17

Abstract: Under the new trend of digitalization leading the era, the popularity and development of digital finance have become key components in promoting better corporate practices and investment activities such as social responsibility fulfillment. Against the backdrop of the government’s advocacy of high-quality economic development, this article uses data from China’s A-share-listed companies from 2011–2021, based on the Digital Finance Index of Peking University and ESG rating data of China Securities Corporation, in order to analyze the impact of the level of digital finance development on corporate ESG performance in China, and to explore the paths and heterogeneity of such impacts. The results of the empirical analysis show that the level of digital finance development has a significant positive impact on corporate ESG performance, with financing constraints playing a mediating role in this path. In the heterogeneity analysis, we find that this impact shows a more significant effect among non-state-owned enterprises as well as enterprises in the central and western regions. The findings of the article’s empirical tests show that the continuous development of digital finance helps enterprises enable social responsibility, which has certain implications for the synergy between financial institutions, government departments, and corporate entities to promote high-quality economic development.

Keywords: digital finance; ESG; financing constraints; social responsibility (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/13/10685/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/13/10685/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:15:y:2023:i:13:p:10685-:d:1188468

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().