ESG And Corporate Financing Constraints

With the rise of ESG investment concept,the academic research on ESG is in full swing.At present,the research on the value effect and influence mechanism of ESG is relatively scarce.Compared with European and American markets,the information environment of Chinese capital market is relatively opaque,on the one hand,financing channels are limited,on the other hand,subject to information asymmetry and principal-agent problems,our enterprise financing constraints are in a severe predicament.Based on this,this paper studies the impact of ESG rating on corporate financing constraints from the perspective of information environment.This paper argues that the mechanism by which ESG rating affects corporate financing constraints is as follows: First,based on the path of information effect,enterprises with better ESG rating performance will send more positive and positive signals to the market.By increasing the amount and quality of information,enterprises can improve the information environment of listed companies and reduce the level of internal and external information asymmetry,thus effectively easing the degree of corporate financing constraints.Second,based on the path of governance effect,on the one hand,enterprises with good ESG rating performance mean that the internal governance mechanism of enterprises is more perfect.On the other hand,enterprises with a good ESG rating will get more attention from analysts and more media exposure,and the external supervision mechanism will be more perfect,which can effectively restrain the agency costs of enterprises and help alleviate the financing difficulties of enterprises.Third,based on the path of stakeholders,good ESG performance meets the regulatory requirements,investors have higher trust,and financing limit and financing efficiency are expected to be improved.Fourthly,based on the path of sustainable development,enterprises with better ESG rating performance will pay more attention to long-term development,improve operating efficiency and financial performance,so as to effectively reduce the degree of corporate financing constraints.Based on the above background,this paper takes the ESG rating of China Securities as the proxy variable of ESG,selects the data of Shanghai and Shenzhen A-share listed companies from2015 to 2021,constructs KZ index as the proxy variable of corporate financing constraints,and uses mixed regression model and fixed effect model to empirically test the influence of ESG rating on the financing constraints of Chinese enterprises.At the same time,the mediating effect of information environment is examined.Furthermore,it is further investigated whether the value effect of ESG rating changes significantly when the market environment changes greatly due to different agency costs and the epidemic.Finally,robustness test was carried out to verify the rationality and reliability of the conclusion by using SA index to measure enterprise financing constraints,lag explained variables and instrumental variables test.Based on empirical test and analysis,the effective conclusions of this paper are as follows:(1)Compared with enterprises with low ESG rating,enterprises with high ESG rating have lower financing constraints;(2)Information environment plays an intermediary role in the influence of ESG rating on corporate financing constraints;(3)Compared with enterprises with lower agency costs,the effect of ESG rating on corporate financing constraints is more obvious in enterprises with higher agency costs;(4)When the market environment changes greatly due to the impact of the epidemic,the role of ESG rating on corporate financing constraints is weakened.