Export effect and influence mechanism of foreign ownership

Abstract

This paper empirically tests the export impact of foreign ownership by using the dataset of Chinese listed firms from 2003 to 2016. The robust results show that foreign ownership facilitates a company’s exports significantly, but only long-term foreign investors can enhance export performance. We conclude that foreign ownership has a weaker promotive role on exports in state-owned enterprises (SOEs), compared with private enterprises. Finally, we examine whether the influence mechanism runs though R&D, but surprisingly there is no evidence to support this prediction, even for high-tech enterprises. This paper provides micro-evidence that foreign ownership can increase exports under the background of China’s progressive equity reform and supplies indirect evidence of the information intermediary role of foreign ownership in promoting firm exports.