Research On The Impact Of Issuer ESG Performance On Green Bond Pricing

Green bonds are an important part of the entire green financial system,and the healthy development of the green bond market is of great significance to promoting China’s transition to a low-carbon economy and a green economy.On the one hand,domestic green bonds started relatively late,and their pricing theory needs to be further deepened and improved on the basis of general bond pricing theory.Reasonable pricing is conducive to the successful issuance of green bonds,which in turn promotes the stable and orderly development of the green bond market.On the other hand,the domestic application of ESG in the bond field has just started,and there is little research coverage.Both issuers and investors of green bonds should pay more attention to green factors,and the ESG performance of issuers is undoubtedly a more comprehensive indicator of green and sustainable development.Research on the relationship between issuer ESG performance and green bond pricing has great theoretical and practical significance.Based on the existing literature,this paper takes the green bonds issued in the Interbank Bond Market and the exchange market of Shanghai and Shenzhen from 2016 to 2021 as sample data,and uses ChinaBond ESG score data,bond issuance factors,corporate financial data and macroeconomic data to construct a structure.The multiple regression model studies the relationship between issuer ESG performance and green bond pricing,and draws four main conclusions:(1)Issuer ESG performance is significantly negatively correlated with green bond issuance spreads,that is,the higher the issuer ESG performance,the higher the green bond pricing.Judging from the individual performance of issuers’ ESG performance,both environmental performance and social responsibility performance are significantly negatively correlated with green bond issuance spreads,while corporate governance performance has no significant relationship with green bond issuance spreads.(2)From the perspective of the issuer’s corporate property,the issuer’s state-owned characteristics have a certain strengthening effect on the negative correlation between ESG performance and green bond issuance spreads.(3)Among the factors affecting the spread of green bond issuance,ESG performance(score)and issuer credit rating indicators have a mutually weakening relationship.Based on the above analysis conclusions,we call on green bond issuers to have an in-depth understanding of ESG concepts,actively improve their ESG performance in corporate operations,and achieve long-term and high-quality development.We call on other green bond participants to pay more attention to the ESG performance of green bond issuers and jointly promote the construction of the ESG system.