Does investment-financing maturity mismatch boost firm performance under digital economy? Inverted U-shaped relationship test

In China’s economic practice, the mismatch between investment and financing horizons is widespread, exerting complex effects on corporate performance. With the rise of the digital economy, enterprises facing this mismatch exhibit new dynamic characteristics in innovation activities and outputs. Therefore, this study employs a comprehensive approach using quadratic regression and panel threshold models, based on 33,802 firm-year observations. It also constructs a provincial digital economy index using the entropy weight method to further explore the relationship between investment-financing maturity mismatch and corporate performance. The findings reveal that under the current digital economy environment, the relationship between investment-financing maturity mismatch and corporate performance still follows an inverted U-shaped curve. Firm characteristics significantly influence this relationship: investment-financing maturity mismatch tends to affect technology-based firms earlier, though technology-based firms exhibit lower sensitivity to mismatch compared to non-technology-based firms. Furthermore, digital economic development flattens the inverted U-curve, shifting its inflection point to the left, with technology-based firms exhibiting this effect more pronounced than non-technologybased firms. This divergence in the inverted U-relationship among firms can be attributed to differences in internal governance and market competitive environments. First published online 31 July 2026