IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v15y2023i12p9260-d1166450.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Non-Linear Impacts and Spatial Spillover of Digital Finance on Green Total Factor Productivity: An Empirical Study of Smart Cities in China

Author

Listed:
  • Ying Yu

    (School of Economics & Management, Northwest University, Xi’an 710127, China)

  • Qian Zhang

    (School of Economics & Management, Northwest University, Xi’an 710127, China)

  • Fan Song

    (School of Economics & Management, Northwest University, Xi’an 710127, China)

Abstract

Smart cities are important digital economy vehicles that can fully exploit the green attributes and spatial penetration of digital finance. Using panel data for 100 cities selected as pilot smart cities in China from 2011 to 2019, this paper applies a spatial econometric model to analyze the non-linear impacts of digital finance on GTFP and its spatial spillovers. Furthermore, it utilizes mediation models to study their transmission mechanisms. The results show that digital finance first inhibits and then promotes GTFP, with spatial spillovers in four dimensions: geography, information, technology, and human capital. Its mediating mechanisms are innovation effects, structural effects, and scale effects. The statistical significance of the U-shaped relationship is regionally heterogeneous, according to different levels of human capital, informatization, urbanization, and financial marketization. Based on digital finance’s U-shaped and heterogeneous impacts on GTFP, policy recommendations are to adopt differentiated development strategies according to specific levels of digital finance and underlying conditions in smart cities. Stimulating the innovation and structural effects and suppressing the scale effects will help digital finance breakthrough inflection points, and will positively promote GTFP. It is also necessary to encourage inter-regional cooperation among smart cities to fully release spatial spillover dividends through technology sharing, information transfer, and talent exchange to promote the linked improvement of GTFP.

Suggested Citation

  • Ying Yu & Qian Zhang & Fan Song, 2023. "Non-Linear Impacts and Spatial Spillover of Digital Finance on Green Total Factor Productivity: An Empirical Study of Smart Cities in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-22, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:15:y:2023:i:12:p:9260-:d:1166450
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/12/9260/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/12/9260/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ke-Liang Wang & Rui-Rui Zhu & Yun-He Cheng, 2022. "Does the Development of Digital Finance Contribute to Haze Pollution Control? Evidence from China," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(7), pages 1-21, April.
    2. Hui, Peng & Zhao, Hui & Liu, Desheng & Li, Ye, 2023. "How does digital finance affect regional innovation capacity? A spatial econometric analysis," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    3. Mills, Evan, 2023. "Green Remittances: A novel form of sustainability finance," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).
    4. Zhao, Jun & Jiang, Qingzhe & Dong, Xiucheng & Dong, Kangyin & Jiang, Hongdian, 2022. "How does industrial structure adjustment reduce CO2 emissions? Spatial and mediation effects analysis for China," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C).
    5. Qin, Xiaodi & Wu, Haitao & Li, Rongrong, 2022. "Digital finance and household carbon emissions in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    6. Paul Almeida & Bruce Kogut, 1999. "Localization of Knowledge and the Mobility of Engineers in Regional Networks," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 45(7), pages 905-917, July.
    7. Xinshu Zhao & John G. Lynch & Qimei Chen, 2010. "Reconsidering Baron and Kenny: Myths and Truths about Mediation Analysis," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 37(2), pages 197-206, August.
    8. Rijia Ding & Fenfen Shi & Suli Hao, 2022. "Digital Inclusive Finance, Environmental Regulation, and Regional Economic Growth: An Empirical Study Based on Spatial Spillover Effect and Panel Threshold Effect," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(7), pages 1-25, April.
    9. Yi, Ming & Liu, Yafen & Sheng, Mingyue Selena & Wen, Le, 2022. "Effects of digital economy on carbon emission reduction: New evidence from China," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 171(C).
    10. Mingyong Hong & Mengjie Tian & Ji Wang, 2022. "Digital Inclusive Finance, Agricultural Industrial Structure Optimization and Agricultural Green Total Factor Productivity," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(18), pages 1-18, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Qingmin Yin & Nan Su & Chenhui Ding, 2024. "The Nonlinear Effects of Digital Finance on Corporate ESG Performance: Evidence from China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(18), pages 1-27, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Wei, Xiaobei & Yang, Zongpu & Yan, Yongjun & Sun, Jia, 2024. "Rural E-commerce, Digital finance, and urban–rural common prosperity: A Quasi-natural Experiment Based on China's Comprehensive Demonstration of E-commerce Entering Rural Areas Policy," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 69(PB).
    2. Dong, Kangyin & Liu, Yang & Wang, Jianda & Dong, Xiucheng, 2024. "Is the digital economy an effective tool for decreasing energy vulnerability? A global case," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 216(C).
    3. Kangni Lyu & Shuwang Yang & Kun Zheng & Yao Zhang, 2023. "How Does the Digital Economy Affect Carbon Emission Efficiency? Evidence from Energy Consumption and Industrial Value Chain," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(2), pages 1-20, January.
    4. Yang Shen & Xiaoyang Guo & Xiuwu Zhang, 2023. "Digital Financial Inclusion, Land Transfer, and Agricultural Green Total Factor Productivity," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(8), pages 1-25, April.
    5. Keyong Zhang & Yifeng Wen & Yunxia Wu, 2024. "How Digital Innovation Ecosystems Facilitate Low-Carbon Transformation of the Economy Based on a Dynamic Qualitative Comparative Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(22), pages 1-21, November.
    6. Isaac Appiah-Otoo & Xudong Chen, 2025. "Is crowdfunding the solution? Appraising the environmental contributions of crowdfunding," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 27(1), pages 831-855, January.
    7. Gao, Xiaoxue, 2023. "Digital transformation in finance and its role in promoting financial transparency," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 58(C).
    8. S. Arunachalam & Sridhar N. Ramaswami & Pol Herrmann & Doug Walker, 2018. "Innovation pathway to profitability: the role of entrepreneurial orientation and marketing capabilities," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 46(4), pages 744-766, July.
    9. Bilgihan, Anil & Madanoglu, Melih & Ricci, Peter, 2016. "Service attributes as drivers of behavioral loyalty in casinos: The mediating effect of attitudinal loyalty," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 14-21.
    10. Tianchu Feng & Andrea Appolloni & Jiayu Chen, 2024. "How does corporate digital transformation affect carbon productivity? Evidence from Chinese listed companies," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 26(12), pages 31425-31445, December.
    11. Hu, Hui & Qi, Shaozhou & Chen, Yuanzhi, 2023. "Using green technology for a better tomorrow: How enterprises and government utilize the carbon trading system and incentive policies," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    12. Dongqing Han & Dayong Zhang & Peng Yue & Zhengxu Cao, 2024. "Toward Sustainable Development: Can Digital Transformation of Industrial Enterprise Drive Carbon Reduction?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(23), pages 1-18, November.
    13. Chen, Zeyu & Tang, Yuhong & Shen, Hebin & Liu, Jiali & Hu, Zheng, 2024. "Threshold effects of Government digital development and land resource disparity on Urban carbon efficiency in China," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 94(C).
    14. Kareklas, Ioannis & Muehling, Darrel D. & King, Skyler, 2019. "The effect of color and self-view priming in persuasive communications," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 33-49.
    15. Ashish Arora & Michelle Gittelman & Sarah Kaplan & John Lynch & Will Mitchell & Nicolaj Siggelkow & Aaron K. Chatterji & Michael Findley & Nathan M. Jensen & Stephan Meier & Daniel Nielson, 2016. "Field experiments in strategy research," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(1), pages 116-132, January.
    16. Jarle Moen, 2005. "Is Mobility of Technical Personnel a Source of R&D Spillovers?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 23(1), pages 81-114, January.
    17. Tang, Yunfeng & Zhang, Xuan & Lu, Shibao & Taghizadeh-Hesary, Farhad, 2023. "Digital finance and air pollution in China: Evolution characteristics, impact mechanism and regional differences," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 86(PA).
    18. Boeker, Warren & Howard, Michael D. & Basu, Sandip & Sahaym, Arvin, 2021. "Interpersonal relationships, digital technologies, and innovation in entrepreneurial ventures," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 495-507.
    19. Yi Yong Lee & Chin Lay Gan & Tze Wei Liew, 2023. "Thwarting Instant Messaging Phishing Attacks: The Role of Self-Efficacy and the Mediating Effect of Attitude towards Online Sharing of Personal Information," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(4), pages 1-23, February.
    20. Shuangshuang Fan & Yichao Li & William Mbanyele & Xiufeng Lai, 2025. "Determinants and Pathways for Inclusive Growth in China: Investigation Based on Artificial Intelligence (AI) Algorithm," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 65(3), pages 1231-1264, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:15:y:2023:i:12:p:9260-:d:1166450. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.