The Impact of Digital Transformation on Corporate Financialization and Its Mechanisms: Evidence from Non-Financial Listed Companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen A-Shares, 2009-2023

Abstract

Currently, corporate financialization has become prominent, and the issue of the economy “shifting from the real to the virtual” is increasingly acute, posing significant challenges to the development of the real economy. As a core strategic pathway for driving industrial upgrading and value reconfiguration, digital transformation holds important implications for exploring its dynamic effects on the real economy and promoting high-quality development of real industries. This paper takes non-financial listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen A-shares from 2009 to 2023 as the research sample and empirically examines the impact of digital transformation on corporate financialization and its underlying mechanisms. The results show that digital transformation significantly inhibits corporate financialization, reduces the proportion of financial asset allocation, and exerts a positive effect on the development of the real economy. Specifically, digital transformation suppresses financialization by enhancing internal control quality and reducing information asymmetry, thereby improving commercial credit financing, alleviating financing constraints, and weakening the “precautionary” (liquidity reservoir) motive; it also promotes resource allocation efficiency, fosters corporate innovation, and increases the return on real investment, thereby curbing the “substitution” motive. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that the inhibitory effect of digital transformation on corporate financialization is more pronounced in non-state-owned enterprises and non-high-tech enterprises. This study proposes solutions to address the existing financialization problems in real-sector enterprises, underscores the critical importance of real economy development, and elucidates the mechanisms and positive impacts through which digital transformation promotes the shift of enterprises “from the virtual back to the real” and empowers the real economy.