Does financing constraints affect firms' R&D? —Evidence from Chinese listed firms

Abstract

R&D investments of enterprises require long-term and sustained support of large amounts of capital. So the access to external financing resources is a key factor affecting R&D investments. This paper discusses the theoretical mechanism of the impact of financial constraints on R&D expenses. Then the panel data of 2095 A-share listed companies in China from 2012 to 2017 is used as a sample for empirical test of the impact of financial constraints on R&D based on the fixed-effect model. The results show that financing constraints have an inhibitory effect on R&D investments of enterprises. Additionally, for non-state-owned enterprises, the impact of financing constraints on R&D expenses is very significant while the impact of financial constraints is not obvious for state-owned enterprises.