IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecanpo/v83y2024icp845-857.html

Government social capital and bond credit ratings

Author

Listed:
  • Zhang, Fan
  • Zhang, Jiewei
  • Wang, Zhuquan

Abstract

Few studies have explored the impact of heterogeneous government investment on corporate bond ratings from the perspective of government social capital allocation. This paper examines the bond market's response to government social capital allocation, utilizing empirical data from the bond ratings of listed companies issued between 2008 and 2020. The analysis begins with a rational explanation, conceptual definition, and index construction of government social capital. The empirical research finds that government social capital allocation significantly enhances corporate credit ratings. Mechanism tests reveal that local governments provide “government support” signals through short-term and long-term borrowing, enabling firms to secure more long-term loans and reduce their default risk. These signals are captured by rating agencies, which then influence the rating outcomes. Heterogeneity tests indicate that the positive impact of government capital allocation on ratings is more pronounced during periods of corporate financial distress. Furthermore, foreign rating agencies are better able to capture signals of government social capital allocation, and their independence confirms that high ratings are not the result of rating inflation.

Suggested Citation

  • Zhang, Fan & Zhang, Jiewei & Wang, Zhuquan, 2024. "Government social capital and bond credit ratings," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 845-857.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecanpo:v:83:y:2024:i:c:p:845-857
    DOI: 10.1016/j.eap.2024.07.014
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0313592624001814
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.eap.2024.07.014?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Michalski, Lachlan & Low, Rand Kwong Yew, 2024. "Determinants of corporate credit ratings: Does ESG matter?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 94(C).
    2. Kimberly J. Cornaggia & Gopal V. Krishnan & Changjiang Wang, 2017. "Managerial Ability and Credit Ratings," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 34(4), pages 2094-2122, December.
    3. Grossman, Sanford J & Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1980. "On the Impossibility of Informationally Efficient Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(3), pages 393-408, June.
    4. Livingston, Miles & Poon, Winnie P.H. & Zhou, Lei, 2018. "Are Chinese credit ratings relevant? A study of the Chinese bond market and credit rating industry," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 216-232.
    5. Merton, Robert C, 1974. "On the Pricing of Corporate Debt: The Risk Structure of Interest Rates," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 29(2), pages 449-470, May.
    6. Shi, Hao & Huang, Shaoqing, 2014. "How Much Infrastructure Is Too Much? A New Approach and Evidence from China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 272-286.
    7. Ye, Zhen & Zhang, Fangzhu & Coffman, D’Maris & Xia, Senmao & Wang, Zhifeng & Zhu, Zhonghua, 2022. "China’s urban construction investment bond: Contextualising a financial tool for local government," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).
    8. Wang, Yuyue & Fang, Hongyan & Luo, Ronghua, 2022. "Does state ownership affect rating quality? Evidence from China's corporate bond market," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    9. Guo, Di & Guo, Yan & Jiang, Kun, 2016. "Government-subsidized R&D and firm innovation: Evidence from China," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(6), pages 1129-1144.
    10. Meghana Ayyagari & Asli Demirgüç-Kunt & Vojislav Maksimovic, 2008. "How Important Are Financing Constraints? The Role of Finance in the Business Environment," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 22(3), pages 483-516, November.
    11. Yuxin Zhu & Dazuo Tian & Feng Yan, 2020. "Effectiveness of Entropy Weight Method in Decision-Making," Mathematical Problems in Engineering, Hindawi, vol. 2020, pages 1-5, March.
    12. Hu, Xiaolu & Huang, Haozhi & Pan, Zheyao & Shi, Jing, 2019. "Information asymmetry and credit rating: A quasi-natural experiment from China," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 132-152.
    13. Kenneth Arrow, 1962. "Economic Welfare and the Allocation of Resources for Invention," NBER Chapters, in: The Rate and Direction of Inventive Activity: Economic and Social Factors, pages 609-626, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Siqi Li & Yunjie Wu, 2022. "Government subsidies, ownership structure and operating performance of state-owned enterprises: evidence from China," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 54(56), pages 6480-6496, December.
    15. Meng, Lingxing & Hou, Yufei & Dong, Tianyu & Su, Wen, 2024. "Loose monetary policy and corporate NPD R&D innovation," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 92(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. Hu, Xiaolu & Shi, Jing & Wang, Lafang & Yu, Jing, 2020. "Foreign ownership in Chinese credit ratings industry: Information revelation or certification?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    2. Hasan, Mostafa Monzur & Hossain, Ashrafee & Jiang, Haiyan, 2025. "Political sentiment and credit ratings," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 57(3).
    3. Ke Sun, 2022. "Do Rating Change Announcements Transfer Effective Information? Test on the Effectiveness and Sustainability of Credit Rating in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(21), pages 1-15, October.
    4. Wang, Yuyue & Fang, Hongyan & Luo, Ronghua, 2022. "Does state ownership affect rating quality? Evidence from China's corporate bond market," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    5. Cheng, Feiyang & Gao, Haoyu & Pan, Xiaofei & Qian, Meijun & Zhou, Qing (Clara), 2025. "China's debt market: Evolution, regulation, and global integration," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    6. Jiang, Fuxiu & Wang, Weiyi & Zheng, Xiaojia, 2024. "Board chair and credit rating of family firms: Evidence from China," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    7. Wen, Wen & Dong, Jinghan & Niu, Yuhao, 2026. "Public data availability and bond credit spreads: Evidence from China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    8. Huang, Guan-Ying & Shen, Carl Hsin-han & Wu, Zhen-Xing, 2023. "Firm-level political risk and debt choice," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    9. Alexander Galetovic & Ángel Cabrera, "undated". "Tópicos en la Economía de la Investigación Tecnológica," Documentos de Trabajo 121, Instituto de Economia. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile..
    10. Wenming Xu & Yan Liu, 2021. "Does reputational capital affect credit rating agencies?: empirical evidence from a natural experiment in China," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 51(3), pages 433-468, June.
    11. Yan, Chen & Ji, Yaxing & Chen, Rui, 2023. "Research on the mechanism of selective industrial policies on enterprises' innovation performance ——Evidence from China's photovoltaic industry," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 215(C).
    12. Aggarwal, Nidhi & Singh, Manish K. & Thomas, Susan, 2023. "Do decreases in Distance-to-Default predict rating downgrades?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    13. Toledo, Ralph Rendell, 2026. "The Economics of Gossip: Informal Information Markets in Social Networks," SocArXiv n7m8r_v1, Center for Open Science.
    14. Chen, Yu & Wang, Yuandi & Hu, Die & Zhou, Zhao, 2020. "Government R&D subsidies, information asymmetry, and the role of foreign investors: Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment on the shanghai-hong kong stock connect," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    15. Skold, Karl Durwood, 1989. "The integration of alternative information systems: an application to the Hogs and Pigs report," ISU General Staff Papers 1989010108000010239, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    16. Chen, Tsung-Kang & Tseng, Yijie & Hao, Yun, 2025. "Readability of asset securitization reporting and bank holding company’s credit risk," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    17. Li, Hao & Wang, Gaowang, 2025. "The Optimality of Gradualism in Economies with Financial Markets," MPRA Paper 125158, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Li, Chuntao & Xie, Yige, 2025. "Business Environment and Bond Credit Ratings: Evidence from China’s Bond Market," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 764-789.
    19. Wang, Guojun & Wang, Yuetang & Yang, Dan & Cheng, Linyin, 2022. "Dividend commitment and bond yields: An examination of wealth transfer effects," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 47(PB).
    20. Juan Ramón Rallo, 2019. "Property is only another name for decentralized creation of knowledge," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 47(1), pages 43-55, February.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    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:eee:ecanpo:v:83:y:2024:i:c:p:845-857. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/economic-analysis-and-policy .

    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.