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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Environ. Sci.
Sec. Environmental Policy and Governance
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fenvs.2024.1400725
This article is part of the Research Topic Advances in Quantitative Analysis of Climate-Driven Environmental Change and Resilience Strategies View all articles

Does ecological accountability restrain the financialization of heavily polluting enterprises? Evidence from China

Provisionally accepted
Weida Wang Weida Wang *Chuanyang Zhao Chuanyang Zhao *Jinhui Ning Jinhui Ning *Shi Yin Shi Yin *Dongyan Zhang Dongyan Zhang *
  • Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding, Hebei, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Ecological accountability is an important means for the Chinese government to promote the development of green policies. In this study, a central environmental protection inspection was used as an exogenous shock event, China's A-share-listed companies were selected as the research sample, and the impact of the central environmental protection inspection on the financialization behavior of heavily polluting enterprises was empirically tested. The research shows that the central environmental protection inspection significantly inhibited the financialization of heavily polluting enterprises. A mechanism analysis showed that the central environmental protection inspection mainly inhibited the financialization of enterprises by promoting green innovation, which shows that the implementation of a central environmental protection inspection can promote green innovation and transformation by forcing heavily polluting enterprises to return to their main business, produce a "crowding-out effect" on financial assets, and place a focus on sustainable and high-quality development. A heterogeneity test showed that the inhibitory effect of the central environmental protection inspection on enterprise financialization was more significant in the sample group of state-owned enterprises and areas with a higher level of development of green finance. This study provides a reference for evaluating the implementation effect and effectiveness of central environmental protection inspections and has significance for regulatory authorities in improving the revision of ecological accountability policies, promoting the green transformation of heavy pollution industries, and regulating the financial asset investment behavior of listed companies.

    Keywords: ecological accountability, Central environmental protection inspection, Enterprise financialization, Heavily polluting enterprises, green transformation

    Received: 22 Mar 2024; Accepted: 26 Jun 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Wang, Zhao, Ning, Yin and Zhang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence:
    Weida Wang, Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding, 071001, Hebei, China
    Chuanyang Zhao, Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding, 071001, Hebei, China
    Jinhui Ning, Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding, 071001, Hebei, China
    Shi Yin, Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding, 071001, Hebei, China
    Dongyan Zhang, Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding, 071001, Hebei, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.