Economic Policy Uncertainty, Managerial Ability, and the Peer Effect of Corporate Investment

Abstract

How the macro-external environment, i.e., the uncertainty of economic policies, affects the peer effect of corporate investment and whether the ability of managers, as the main decision of corporate investment, affects the peer effect of enterprise investment is worthy of further study. This paper uses Baker’s economic policy uncertainty index to obtain China’s economic policy uncertainty index and uses the DEA-Tobit two-stage model to measure the ability of managers, combined with the relevant data of China’s A-share listed companies from 2010 to 2020, to study the impact of economic policy uncertainty and managers’ ability on corporate investment peer effect. We found that China’s economic policy uncertainty increases the information acquisition cost of micro-firms and deepens the degree of information asymmetry, and firms are strongly motivated to learn or even imitate the investment decisions of enterprises in the same industry, thus intensifying the peer effect of investment. For enterprises of different nature, the economic policy uncertainty has a more significant impact on the investment peer effect of non-state-owned enterprises than state-owned enterprises. Compared with large enterprises, the impact of economic policy uncertainty on the investment cohort effect of small enterprises is more significant. Then, through group regression according to the median of managerial ability, we found that the investment peer effect is more obvious in enterprises with low management ability and the effect of economic policy uncertainty on investment peer effect is more significant in the sample with low management ability. Based on the empirical research conclusions, this paper puts forward the following suggestions: improve the corporate governance mechanism and the management ability of managers. In issuing economic policies, the government should be cautious and stable to reduce the uncertainty of economic policies.