Rearch On The Impact Of Major Public Health Emergencies On The Investment Of China’s Listed Companies

This paper studies the impact of major public health emergencies on the investment of Chinese listed companies.We reviewed the existing literatures on the study of the serious infectious diseases’ economic consequences and the factors that influence corporate investment.We use information asymmetry theory,principal-agent theory and real options theory as theoretical foundations.We theoretically analyze the impact of serious infectious diseases on the investment of Chinese listed companies,and propose research hypotheses.We select the 2018-2020 data of 2,191 Chinese listed companies as the sample.Taking the COVID-19 epidemic as an example,we use the event study method and use the epidemic shock dummy variable to construct a panel data regression model to test the research hypothesis.Specifically,we first construct a benchmark regression model to examine the impact of serious infectious diseases on the investment of Chinese listed companies from the perspectives of industrial investment and financial investment.Then we conduct robustness tests by changing the construction method of the explained variables,using quarterly data and taking the SARS epidemic as an example.Further,we examine the heterogeneous impact of serious infectious diseases on corporate investment from the perspectives of company property rights,industry and growth.Finally,we construct a regression model of mediation effect to test the impact mechanism of serious infectious diseases on the level of corporate industrial investment from the perspectives of increased financing constraints and the "crowding out" effect of financial investment.We get the following conclusions: serious infectious diseases can have a significant impact on the investment of Chinese listed companies.Specifically,serious infectious diseases will negatively affect the industrial investment of Chinese listed companies,but will increase their level of financial investment.It has a greater impact on non-stateowned companies,secondary industries,tertiary industries,and high-growth listed companies.The intensification of financing constraints and the "crowding out" effect of financial investment levels are two important influence mechanisms for the decline of listed companies’ industrial investment levels,and they play a partial intermediary role.The innovation and possible marginal contribution of this paper is that we have earlier studied the impact of serious infectious diseases on the economic behavior of microeconomic entities.Our research enriches the related research on the serious infectious diseases’ economic consequences and the factors that affect the investment of listed companies,and provides micro-evidence for macro studies on the serious infectious diseases’ economic consequences.