分行业信息披露与企业创新——来自行业信息披露指引的准自然实验

Information Disclosure by Industry and Enterprise Innovation——A Quasi-Natural Experiment from Industry Information Disclosure Guidelines

创新是引领高质量发展、提高企业竞争力的关键。信息披露制度的完善是资本市场基础设施建设的主要内容,对创新发展具有重要意义。2015年沪深交易所分批次实施的行业信息披露制度为观察信息披露制度建设对微观企业的影响和作用机制提供了极好的研究机会。本文以2012—2020年中国A股上市公司为研究样本,构建多时点双重差分模型,探讨分行业信息披露对企业创新的影响及其作用机制。研究结果表明,分行业信息披露政策的实施对企业专利申请总量没有显著影响,但区分专利类别后发现,表征企业创新质量的高质量专利申请显著增加,说明分行业信息披露促进了有价值的创新,提升了企业创新水平,且这一结论在经过一系列稳健性检验之后依然成立。作用机制分析表明,分行业信息披露通过增大机构投资者治理压力、行业竞争压力以及提高分析师关注度促进企业创新。异质性分析表明,对于信息敏感性和创新性更高的行业,分行业信息披露对企业创新的提升作用更显著。本文从分行业信息披露的视角探讨了企业创新的驱动因素,对我国持续完善信息披露制度建设、推动资本市场更好地服务实体经济高质量发展具有参考意义。

Improving the information disclosure system is an important part of capital market infrastructure construction.To alleviate information asymmetry and improve market efficiency,countries around the world continue to promote regulatory reforms in information disclosure and improve their information disclosure systems.In recent years,China’s capital market has attached increasing importance to the combination of financial and non-financial information,by actively guiding and supervising listed companies to improve the quality of information disclosure,regulating the level of information disclosure,and providing a more comprehensive source of information for the market.The Opinions of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on Accelerating the Construction of a National Unified Market released on April 10,2022 point out that it is necessary to accelerate the establishment of a national unified market system and rules,improve market information exchange channels,optimize important information release channels such as industry announcements,promote market information sharing,improve market operation efficiency,and promote scientific and technological innovation and industrial upgrading.The Shanghai and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges have implemented the information disclosure by industry guidelines in batches to guide listed companies to disclose specific industry information since 2015,providing a quasi-natural experiment to observe the impact of the information disclosure system on listed companies and how.The guidelines require listed companies to disclose macro industry information and operational information that have a significant impact on investors’decision-making in their annual,quarterly,and interim reports based on industry characteristics.The access to more information will improve the decision-making efficiency and may change the decisions of investors,and eventually influence real economic activities.Innovation is the key to economic and social development and will enhance corporate competitiveness,but innovative projects are characterized with highly asymmetric information,so an improved information disclosure system is of great significance for innovation.This study used the 2012-2020 data of Chinese A-share listed companies,and built a staggered DID model to explore the impact of information disclosure by industry on corporate innovation and how.The results show that information disclosure by industry has no significant effect on the total number of patent applications filed by companies,but find a significant positive correlation between high-quality patent applications and information disclosure by industry,indicating that information disclosure by industry promotes valuable innovation and enhances corporate innovation.The conclusion is valid after robustness tests.Mechanism tests show that information disclosure by industry enhances corporate innovation by increasing the governance pressure from institutional investors,industry competition pressure,and analyst attention.Heterogeneity analysis indicates that in industries with higher information sensitivity and innovation,information disclosure by industry has a more significant effect on driving corporate innovation.The main contributions are as follows.Firstly,this paper enriches existing literature on the economic consequences of information disclosure by industry.While existing literature mainly focuses on the impact of information disclosure by industry on information users,this paper,from the perspective of innovation output,examines the economic consequences of information disclosure by industry,and provides policy advice on how to improve the capital market’s information disclosure system and promote innovation.Secondly,while existing literature mainly discusses the impact of the information disclosure environment on innovation at the levels of macro economy and individual companies,this paper investigates how the increment of industry information affects corporate innovation and enriches the literature on factors affecting innovation through information disclosure.Thirdly,based on the efficiency effect of information,this paper explores the impact of information disclosure on information receivers in micro-economic activities,which helps us better understand the roles played by different market participants in corporate innovation activities during the process of improving the information disclosure.Future study could delve into how institutional building in the capital market can serve the high-quality development of the real economy.Firstly,subsequent studies can focus on investment activities such as corporate mergers and acquisitions,capital investments to explore how the construction of the information disclosure system affects real economic activities.Secondly,based on the information sensitivity of industries distinguished in this paper,subsequent studies can further subdivide industry characteristics,and focus on,for example,industries with more financial frauds,long R&D cycles in the pharmaceutical industry,and more safety accidents in the metal smelting industry.Due to the professionalism and complexity of these industries,outsiders have great difficulty in obtaining and analyzing information about companies’operating conditions,making it more challenging for external governance mechanisms to play a role.In these circumstances,can information disclosure by industry have a more apparent incremental effect?Can it generate greater information value?Thirdly,based on changes in the information environment,this paper examines the impact of information disclosure by industry on corporate innovation from the perspective of information receivers.Subsequent studies can explore whether information disclosure by industry helps improve regulation efficiency,and therefore restrain earnings management and violations of laws and regulations.