Do the Green Credit Guidelines Affect Corporate Green Technology Innovation? Empirical Research from China

Green technology innovation is regarded as an important means to achieve sustainable development. Countries all over the world mainly implement green technology innovation policies from the aspects of environmental regulation and financing constraints. The effect of financing constraint policy on enterprise green technology innovation remains to be investigated. Based on the event of “green credit guidelines” issued by China Banking Regulatory Commission in 2012, this paper collects the panel data of China’s 2825 listed companies from 2007 to 2018, constructs a difference-in-difference model, and studies the impact of green credit guidelines on corporate green technology innovation and its mechanism. The empirical results show: First, green credit guidelines can promote corporate green technology innovation on the whole. Second, the mechanism of green credit on enterprise green technology innovation is identified. Green credit guidelines mainly limited green technology innovation through reducing debt financing, rather than through financing constraints. Third, the impact of green credit guidelines on green technology innovation is heterogeneous. Green credit guidelines have a significant effect on the green technology innovation of state-owned and large enterprises, but have no effect on the green technology innovation of non-state-owned and small ones.