地方官员变更与地方债发行

Official's Turnover and Issuance of Local Government Debt

近年来城投债逐渐成为地方政府的主要融资手段之一,引起了中央、投资者对城投债风险的关注。本文考察了地方官员变更对城投债发行概率和发行规模的影响,以及与发债风险和发债成本的关系。通过对2004—2012年我国省级、地级市发债数据的实证分析,本文发现由官员更替引发的不确定性会显著降低城市的发债概率,并减少发债规模。在此基础上,文章进一步研究了官员变更与发债成本的影响。研究发现书记或市长更替会提高城投债的发债风险,增加发债成本。且当变更引发的不确定性程度更高时,对发债成本的影响更加显著。而当城市面临更高的偿债压力时,官员更替对发债成本的影响更加显著。本文的研究丰富了对地方债的理解。

This paper investigates the effect of turnover of local officials on issuance of local government debt in China. Using the data of the municipal investment bonds issued during the period from 2004 to 2012 in China, this paper finds that policy uncertainty caused by turnover of local official will adversely affect the frequency and scale of municipal investment bond issuance. In addition, such policy uncertainty will significantly increase the risk of the municipal investment bonds and thus significantly increase the debt issuance costs; and such effect will be enhanced if the risk of policy uncertainty increases. Furthermore, when cities are under higher pressure of repaying debts, the impact of policy uncertainty on the cost of issuing bonds becomes more significant. This study enriches our understanding of issuance of local government debt.