Fiscal policy promotes corporate green credit: Experience from the construction of energy conservation and emission reduction demonstration cities in China

Using a quasi-natural experiment of the staggered construction of energy conservation and emission reduction (ECER) demonstration cities in China, this paper explores the impact of fiscal policy on green credit (GC) for listed enterprises. The main findings are the following: (1) The ECER demonstration cities policy significantly improves enterprise GC. This conclusion remains robust after considering the heterogeneous treatment effects. (2) By extending the estimation period beyond the policy withdrawal, we use the difference-in-differences designs with multiple groups and periods (DIDM) estimator to compute the average treatment effect of policy switches. The results show that the intervention effect still exists after the policy withdrawal. (3) Direct cash subsidies, corporate green spending, and external financing constraints are the main mechanisms through which the ECER demonstration cities policy works. (4) The effects of the ECER demonstration cities policy are heterogeneous at the batch, urban, industry, and corporate levels. This paper explores the role of fiscal policy on enterprise green financing. The findings provide theoretical and empirical insights for leveraging fiscal tools to enhance environmental governance.