Confucian culture and corporate bond pricing

We investigate the effect of Confucian culture on corporate bond pricing. Using the birthplace data of 56,759 Jinshi in the Ming and Qing dynasties to construct a proxy of Confucian culture, we find a significantly negative relation between Confucian culture and bond pricing: the stronger the Confucian atmosphere of the corporate headquarters’ location, the higher the bond rating and the lower the credit spread. This conclusion still holds after using the distance to the nearest ancient printing office as an instrumental variable and a series of robustness tests. The mechanism test shows that Confucian culture can improve the pricing efficiency of corporate bonds by fostering investors’ trust, alleviating principal–agent problems and restraining bad corporate behaviors. Moreover, the impact of Confucian culture on corporate bond pricing is greater for firms located in regions with weak legal and other formal institutional constraints and for unlisted companies. Our study complements the literature on culture and bond pricing, and provides policy insights from traditional Chinese wisdom for improving the efficiency of financial markets.