Credit Ratings and Firm Innovation

This study examines the impact of credit ratings on corporate innovation activities. A sample of domestic securities-listed companies is selected, and changes in innovation activities are investigated when firms exhibit high sensitivity to credit ratings. Credit rating data from December settlement companies, spanning the period from 2002 to 2019, excluding the financial industry, is employed. A total of 2,179 company-year observations are used, which include corporate patent data as a proxy for measuring innovation performance, to examine the relationship between credit ratings and innovation activities. Furthermore, the study analyzes how these relationships vary across high-tech and non-high-tech industries, as well as investment ratings and speculative ratings. The empirical analysis reveals a significant positive relationship between the sensitivity of firms to credit ratings and their innovation activities. Specifically, firms that are more sensitive to credit rating downgrades show an increase in innovation activities, while no significant results are found for credit rating upgrades. This suggests that firms with a higher likelihood of credit rating downgrades are more likely to actively pursue innovation activities to maintain their current credit rating. Moreover, this asymmetric relationship between credit ratings and innovation is more pronounced in high-tech industries compared to non-high-tech industries, and in investment-rated firms compared to speculative-rated firms. Based on these empirical findings, this study provides important implications for stakeholders and financial market participants regarding the relationship between credit ratings and innovation.