Most Popular

Returnees and Innovation: Evidence from Chinese Publicly Listed Firms

Yibo Qiao, Andrea Ascani, Stefano Breschi, Andrea Morrison, May 28, 2025

We investigate the relationship between high-skill returnees and innovation of Chinese publicly listed firms. To this aim, we construct a unique dataset of 2,499 firms over the period 2002–2016 by combining three different data sources (i.e. CNRDS, CSMAR, and LinkedIn). Our results show that different typologies of returnees (employees, technologists, and managers) with different experiences abroad (work versus study) may bring back different skills and impact differently on firm innovation.

China’s New Goal for Income Distribution: What Does it Mean and are There Tradeoffs?

Martin Ravallion, Shaohua Chen, Mar 16, 2022

China’s political leadership recently committed to expanding the proportion of middle-income groups to create a less polarised, and more ‘olive-shaped’, distribution of wealth. This column considers the potential trade-offs between reducing income polarisation and other goals, including poverty reduction.

BigTech Credit and Monetary Policy Transmission

Yiping Huang, Xiang Li, Han Qiu, Changhua Yu, Dec 07, 2022

By comparing business loans made by a BigTech bank with those made by traditional banks, this study finds that BigTech loans tend to be smaller, and the BigTech lender is more likely to grant credit to new borrowers than conventional banks in response to expansionary monetary policy.

Government-Directed Urban Growth, Firm Entry, and Industrial Land Prices in Chinese Cities

Jan K. Brueckner, Wenhua Liu, Wei Xiao, Junfu Zhang, May 17, 2023

We examine the effect of large-scale administrative reorganization in China, where counties are annexed into cities to accommodate urban growth.

Superstition Everywhere

Jinfan Zhang, Huancheng Du, Mar 09, 2022

In Chinese culture, digit 8 (4) is taken as lucky (unlucky). We find that the numerological superstition has a profound impact across China’s stock, bond and foreign exchange markets, affecting asset prices in both the primary and secondary markets. The superstition effect, i.e., the probability of asset price ending with a lucky (unlucky) digit far exceeds (falls short of) what would be expected by chance, is everywhere.