Peer influence on dividend policy: Evidence from the Chinese stock market

摘要

This study proves that peer influence matters when it comes to a firm's dividend decisions. The "reflection" problem arises when members of the same group behave similarly. To overcome endogeneity problems, we employ instrumental variable techniques based on peers' idiosyncratic risk. The degree to which peer influence affects individual firms differs depending on the competitiveness of the industry and the ratio of the state-owned share of the company. (C) 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.