Corporate Charitable Donations and Financing Constraints

By making use of the data of China' s listed companies during the period of 2008-2013 on the mainboards of Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets and the cash-cash flow sensitivity model put forward by Almeida, this study empirically examines the impact of corporate charitable donation on financing constraints. The results show that corporate charitable donations can significantly reduce the financing constraints. And the more the donations, the fewer the financing constraints. In addition,the charitable donations can help enterprises to obtain long-term credit. Compared to firms with lower level of financing constraints, such effects of donations are more significant among the enterprises with higher level of financing constraints. These evidences suggest that charitable donations may act as signals, which can improve corporate information environment and reduce their financing constraints.