Study On The Effect Of Financial Technology On Enterprise Total Factor Productivity

In recent years,China’s economic growth is facing the triple dilemma of "demand contraction,supply shock,and weakening expectations".The extensive growth mode driven by factor input has gradually fallen into shackles,which profoundly implies that future economic development should not only pursue quantitative expansion,but also focus on quality improvement.At the same time,Fintech can enhance the ability of financial system to serve real economy.It is bound to change the allocation efficiency of credit resources and affect the financing constraints.Therefore,studying how Fintech affects enterprise total factor productivity is an important issue related to the healthy development of China’s economy and the smooth transition of economic growth drivers.In this context,this paper puts forward several hypotheses on the basis of reviewing previous studies,uses A-share listed companies from 2011 to 2021 as the research object,uses the LP method to measure enterprise total factor productivity,and compiles Fintech index to measure the level of Fintech development.Then,the fixed effect model,mediation effect model and moderating effect model are used to study the effect and mechanism of Fintech on enterprise total factor productivity.The empirical results show that Fintech can significantly improve enterprise total factor productivity.Furthermore,this paper weakens the potential endogenous problems through lagging one-period explanatory variables,instrumental variable method and system GMM method,and conducts robustness tests by replacing the calculation method of total factor productivity and the Fintech index,and eliminating specific samples.In addition,this paper also examines the heterogeneity of four factors: location,size,life cycle,and nature of property rights.The study found that in the eastern region,small and medium-sized enterprises,growing enterprises,and non-state-owned enterprises,Fintech can significantly improve enterprise total factor productivity.Finally,this paper studies the mechanism of fintech from the perspective of financing constraints and ownership structure.The results show that easing financing constraints is one of the intermediary channels;The improvement effect of Fintech on enterprise total factor productivity will be weakened with the increase of the shareholding ratio of executives,and strengthened with the increase of ownership concentration.The innovations of this paper are as follows.First,this paper uses the Baidu search index of keywords related to Fintech to compile Fintech index,which provides a new data source and empirical support for related research in the field of Fintech.Second,this paper examines the mechanism of Fintech on enterprise total factor productivity from the perspective of financing constraints and ownership structure,making up for the lack of analysis from the perspective of ownership structure in previous studies.Most of the previous studies on the relationship between Fintech and enterprise total factor productivity started from financing constraints,and less attention was paid to ownership structure.This paper provides a new research perspective by taking the shareholding ratio of executives and the concentration of ownership as the entry point of the incentive mechanism and supervision mechanism.Third,this paper also explores the heterogeneous impact of location,scale,life cycle,and property rights,which refines previous research results.