Empirical study reveals that social security fund holdings enhance corporate ESG performance in Chinese listed firms, indicating that long-term public capital promotes green development.
Compared with other institutional investors, social security funds pursue stable returns, maintain relatively high independence, and exert a certification effect on firms in their portfolios. Using Chinese Shanghai-Shenzhen A-share listed companies from 2011 to 2021 as samples, this paper empirically examines the impact of social security fund holdings on enterprise ESG performance. The results show that social security funds improve ESG performance through corporate governance, incremental financing flexibility, and external pressure. Heterogeneity analysis indicates that the impact is stronger when market competition, government environmental regulation, and regional digital-economy development are high. The findings provide evidence that long-term public capital supports the stable development of the capital market and green investment, including advanced communication infrastructure and energy- saving technology sectors.
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Chen et al. (2026) studied this question.
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