IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/coecpo/v44y2026i3p717-735.html

VAT credit refund policy and outward foreign direct investment: Firm‐level evidence from China

Author

Listed:
  • Qilin Mao
  • Yueqing Wang

Abstract

We employ China's 2018 value‐added tax credit refund reform as a quasi‐natural experiment to investigate the policy's impact on firms' outward foreign direct investment (FDI). We find that the policy significantly promotes firms' outward FDI through improved liquidity, increased risk‐taking capacity, and heightened innovation incentives. The effect is stronger for non‐state‐owned enterprises, high‐tax‐burden firms, credit‐accumulating firms, and those with limited tax‐shifting capacity. The policy also expands outward FDI diversification across countries and industries. Additionally, we evaluate the policy's effects from a supply chain perspective, revealing that affected supplier firms can substantially enhance their customer firms' outward FDI through supply chain transmission mechanisms.

Suggested Citation

  • Qilin Mao & Yueqing Wang, 2026. "VAT credit refund policy and outward foreign direct investment: Firm‐level evidence from China," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 44(3), pages 717-735, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:coecpo:v:44:y:2026:i:3:p:717-735
    DOI: 10.1111/coep.70027
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/coep.70027
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/coep.70027?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mara Faccio & Maria-Teresa Marchica & Roberto Mura, 2011. "Large Shareholder Diversification and Corporate Risk-Taking," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(11), pages 3601-3641.
    2. Philippe Askenazy & Aida Caldera & Guillaume Gaulier & Delphine Irac, 2015. "Financial constraints and foreign market entries or exits: firm-level evidence from France," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 151(2), pages 231-253, May.
    3. Peng, Ya & Zhang, Xueyong, 2024. "Economic policy uncertainty in OFDI host countries and the cross-section of stock returns," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 149(C).
    4. Jože P. Damijan & Sašo Polanec & Janez Prašnikar, 2007. "Outward FDI and Productivity: Micro‐evidence from Slovenia," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(1), pages 135-155, January.
    5. Liu, Yuli & Ge, Yuejing & Hu, Zhiding & Wang, Shufang, 2018. "Culture and capital flows—Exploring the spatial differentiation of China's OFDI," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 27-45.
    6. Ding, Yibing & Sun, Yining & Zhang, Xiaoou, 2025. "Customer digital transformation and enterprise risk-taking: Evidence from Chinese supply chains," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    7. Huang, Yisong & Sun, Ze & Huang, Yan, 2025. "Exploring the effect of VAT carryforward and refund policy on enhancing innovation efficiency among China's A-share listed firms," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    8. Anna M. Costello, 2020. "Credit Market Disruptions and Liquidity Spillover Effects in the Supply Chain," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(9), pages 3434-3468.
    9. repec:wyi:journl:002196 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Dong, Yan & Tian, Jinhuan & Wen, Qiang, 2022. "Environmental regulation and outward foreign direct investment: Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    11. Rao, Nirupama, 2016. "Do tax credits stimulate R&D spending? The effect of the R&D tax credit in its first decade," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 1-12.
    12. Zhao Chen & Xian Jiang & Zhikuo Liu & Juan Carlos Suárez Serrato & Daniel Yi Xu, 2023. "Tax Policy and Lumpy Investment Behaviour: Evidence from China’s VAT Reform," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 90(2), pages 634-674.
    13. Marianne Bertrand & Esther Duflo & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2004. "How Much Should We Trust Differences-In-Differences Estimates?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 119(1), pages 249-275.
    14. Kutsuna, Kenji & Smith, Janet Kiholm & Smith, Richard & Yamada, Kazuo, 2016. "Supply-chain spillover effects of IPOs," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 150-168.
    15. Niu, Qian & Yuan, Jin & Kang, Fengli & Wen, Le, 2025. "VAT credit refund policy and corporate risk-taking: Evidence from China," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    16. Elhanan Helpman & Marc J. Melitz & Stephen R. Yeaple, 2004. "Export Versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(1), pages 300-316, March.
    17. Geng, Yong & Xiang, Xiaojian & Zhang, Guosheng & Li, Xue, 2024. "Digital transformation along the supply chain: Spillover effects from vertical partnerships," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 183(C).
    18. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-01203566 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Bloom, Nick & Griffith, Rachel & Van Reenen, John, 2002. "Do R&D tax credits work? Evidence from a panel of countries 1979-1997," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(1), pages 1-31, July.
    20. Boubakri, Narjess & Cosset, Jean-Claude & Saffar, Walid, 2013. "The role of state and foreign owners in corporate risk-taking: Evidence from privatization," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(3), pages 641-658.
    21. Liu, Qing & Lu, Yi, 2015. "Firm investment and exporting: Evidence from China's value-added tax reform," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(2), pages 392-403.
    22. Mao, Qilin & Guo, Chongyang, 2025. "Industrial robots, supply chain spillover effect and firm employment: Evidence from China," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 229(C).
    23. Kalina Manova & Shang-Jin Wei & Zhiwei Zhang, 2015. "Firm Exports and Multinational Activity Under Credit Constraints," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 97(3), pages 574-588, July.
    24. Chandra, Piyush & Long, Cheryl, 2013. "VAT rebates and export performance in China: Firm-level evidence," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 13-22.
    25. Liu, Lihua & Cao, Lele & Cao, Yuqiang & Lu, Meiting & Shan, Yaowen, 2024. "VAT credit refunds and firm productivity: Evidence from China's VAT reform," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 93(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Shao, Yuchen & Xiao, Chengrui, 2019. "Corporate tax policy and heterogeneous firm innovation: Evidence from a developing country," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 470-486.
    2. Qi, Qiuyue & Lu, Ping & Zhao, Xiangru, 2025. "Corporate carbon regulation, green innovation and supply chain spillover," Innovation and Green Development, Elsevier, vol. 4(5).
    3. Jean Acheson & Rory Malone, 2020. "Respect Your Elders: Evidence from Ireland’s R&D Tax Credit Reform," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 51(1), pages 105-131.
    4. Yu, Wei & Wang, Chenglong & Zhu, Keying & Kang, Hainan, 2025. "Can value-added tax refund policy alleviate corporate financial distress? Evidence from China," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    5. Tania Babina & Sabrina T. Howell, 2018. "Entrepreneurial Spillovers from Corporate R&D," NBER Working Papers 25360, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Mukherjee, Abhiroop & Singh, Manpreet & Žaldokas, Alminas, 2017. "Do corporate taxes hinder innovation?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(1), pages 195-221.
    7. Che, Yi & Li, Xuchao & Zhang, Yan & Zhao, Lin, 2024. "Labor protection and firms’ risk-taking behavior: evidence from China’s New Labor Contract Law," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    8. Siamak Javadi & Abdullah‐Al Masum & Mohsen Aram & Ramesh P. Rao, 2023. "Climate change and corporate cash holdings: Global evidence," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 52(2), pages 253-295, June.
    9. Lu, Bing & Ma, Hong, 2023. "The “Matthew effect” in rebates: How does VAT rebates allocation affect firm export performance," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 225(C).
    10. Schwab, Thomas & Todtenhaupt, Maximilian, 2021. "Thinking outside the box: The cross-border effect of tax cuts on R&D," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 204(C).
    11. Chen, Weixiong & Hao, Hanyu, 2025. "Environmental regulation and outward FDI of Chinese listed companies: The role of technological innovations," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 1797-1816.
    12. Duanmu, Jing-Lin & Norbäck, Pehr-Johan & Lu, Jane Wenzhen & Clegg, Jeremy, 2022. "Contraction under minimum wages? Operational and financial advantages of multinational subsidiaries in China," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 31(2).
    13. Liao, Chengyun & Li, Huihui, 2026. "Value-added tax neutrality and enterprise green strategy: Evidence from China’s credit refund reform," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    14. Ke Ding & Helian Xu & Rongming Yang, 2021. "Taxation and Enterprise Innovation: Evidence from China’s Value-Added Tax Reform," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(10), pages 1-20, May.
    15. Lindemanis, Mārtiņš & Loze, Artūrs & Pajuste, Anete, 2022. "The effect of domestic to foreign ownership change on firm performance in Europe," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    16. Lin, Kang & Tian, Kailan & Gao, Xiang & Zhao, Yu & Yang, Cuihong, 2024. "Responses of China's cross-border investors to domestic environmental regulations," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    17. Yeoh, Siew-Boey & Hooy, Chee-Wooi, 2024. "Is the military CEO aggressive or conservative? Differences in legal and cultural factors around the world," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 70(PA).
    18. Pauline Bourgeon & Jean-Charles Bricongne & Guillaume Gaulier, 2012. "Financing time to trade: Evidence from French firms," Post-Print halshs-00677343, HAL.
    19. Li, Linjie & Liu, Xiaming & Yuan, Dong & Yu, Miaojie, 2017. "Does outward FDI generate higher productivity for emerging economy MNEs? – Micro-level evidence from Chinese manufacturing firms," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 26(5), pages 839-854.
    20. Ding, Haoyuan & Lin, Shu & Wu, Shujie & Ye, Haichun, 2024. "Financial spillovers of foreign direct investment: Evidence from China," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:coecpo:v:44:y:2026:i:3:p:717-735. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/weaaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.