Abstract: It is of academic value and practical significance to explore the effect of deregulation of loan interest rate on the debt financing of group companies for revealing the law of debt distribution between parent and subsidiary companies and its mechanism. The quasi-natural experiment based on the gradual liberalization of the upper and lower limits of loan interest rates by the People’s Bank of China, and the empirical study based on the double-difference model constructed depending on the nature of property rights indicate that the liberalization of the loan interest rate ceiling significantly eases the financing constraints of non-state-owned enterprises, thereby reducing the concentration level of debt, while the lower limit of the loan interest rate significantly increases the financing constraints of non-state-owned enterprises, thereby significantly increasing the concentration level of debt, showing an asymmetry effect. Besides, the restraining effect of concentrated liabilities is more significant in the sample group where the profitability of the parent company is worse. The intensifying effect of concentrated liabilities is more pronounced in the sample group with a better profitability of the parent company. The conclusions above are still valid after the series robustness test. From the perspective of debt distribution between the parent and subsidiary companies, this paper examines the effects of interest rate liberalization on the form of debt of the corporate groups and its mechanism, which not only helps to reveal the specific motivation of the debt concentration of the enterprise from the perspective of China’s unique financial regulation and environment, but also has important implications for further promoting the deleveraging of corporate groups.

Key words: interest rate liberalization, concentrated debt, debt distribution, earnings distribution

摘要： 探讨贷款利率管制放开如何影响集团企业债务融资形式，对于揭示集团公司债务分布规律及其作用机制具有重要的学术价值和现实意义。基于中国央行逐步放开贷款利率上下限作为准自然实验，基于产权性质构造双重差分模型进行实证研究发现：贷款利率上限放开显著抑制非国有企业集中负债程度，而贷款利率下限的放开显著提高非国有企业集中负债程度，两者呈现非对称性的影响；贷款利率上限管制放开对非国有企业集中负债的抑制效应在母公司盈利状况更差的样本组中更显著，贷款利率下限放开对非国有企业集中负债的加剧效应在母公司盈利状况更好的样本组中更显著。上述研究结论经过系列稳健性检验依然成立。作用机制检验发现，贷款利率上限放开显著缓解了非国有企业融资约束，贷款利率下限放开显著加剧了非国有企业融资约束，这与集中程度的研究结论是一致的。从母子公司间债务分布视角考察了利率管制放松对集团负债融资模式的影响及其作用机制，有助于从中国独特金融制度环境揭示集团企业集中负债的具体动因，对进一步推进集团企业去杠杆行为具有重要启示意义。

关键词: 放松利率管制, 集中负债, 债务分布, 盈余分布