Political Connections, Debt Restructuring, and Enterprise Investment: Evidence from China

Abstract

This paper shows that the link between debt restructuring and enterprise investment in emerging economies hinges critically on the political connections. Taking Chinese A-share listed enterprises from 2005 to 2016 as samples, we examine whether and how political connections affect the relationship between debt restructuring and enterprise investment based on the DID method. The results show that compared with nonpolitically connected enterprises, debt restructuring effectively improves the investment efficiency in enterprises with political ties, which is mainly due to alleviating the overinvestment and underinvestment. Furthermore, the positive effect of debt restructuring on investment is more prominent in enterprises with weak strength of political connection. It is worth noting that as the strength of political connection increases from weak to strong, the positive impact of debt restructuring on investment turns to negative impact, which reflects the heterogeneity of connection strength on the relation between debt restructuring and investment. This paper provides new evidence for understanding the investment behaviour of debt restructuring enterprises and provides some policy implications for managers and decision-makers intending to improve the investment efficiency and enhance the sustainable development of enterprises from the perspective of political connections.