Abstract: Innovation stands as a crucial driver of competitive advantage for firms and a key force behind economic development. By engaging in innovative activities, firms can enhance production efficiency, invigorate market transactions, and ultimately propel economic progress. Nevertheless, innovation is frequently associated with substantial investment, high risk, and considerable uncertainty, posing significant challenges to firms in their decision-making processes. Consequently, the significance and complexity of corporate innovation activities have rendered this area a subject of widespread interest in academia and practice. While existing literature mainly explores the influencing factors of firms’ innovation under the assumption of independent decision-making, it pays limited attention to the interactions among the innovative activities of different firms. When firms make decisions, there is a phenomenon known as the peer effect, where they learn from other firms within the same industry, in the same region, or from other associated firms. The field of corporate finance is also increasingly delving into the peer effect as a significant social effect. For instance, Billett et al. (2017) observe that a firm’s decision to issue stocks is influenced by the recent equity refinancing behavior of peer firms. Many studies on peer effects in corporate decision-making have concentrated on learning behavior among firms within the same industry. And spillover theory suggests that firms can effectively learn from their peers. Managers often employ anchoring and adjustment, using peer firms’ decisions as a reference to reduce uncertainty and enhance profitability by observing the actions and effects of early movers. In addition, from the perspective of market competition, senior managers may be under the pressure of performance from peers to maintain the firm’s corresponding performance. And product innovation is an important means to maintain competitive advantage and market share. Therefore, corporate managers need to look to the innovation performance of other firms in the same industry for corresponding research and development. The industry peer effect of corporate innovation is formed when the innovation decisions of firms within an industry enter into the decision function of the firm. However, the analysis of the industry peer effect on corporate innovation not only offers a new external perspective for the correct understanding corporate innovation activities but also scrutinizes the microscopic formation process of corporate innovation decision-making. This study presents an in-depth exploration of firms’ innovation performance, focusing on the perspective of peer effects among firms.
   Using financial and innovation R&D data from China’s A-share market-listed firms and a fixed-effects model spanning 2004-2018, this study empirically investigates the industry peer effects on listed firms’ innovation performance. Additionally, it explores the influence of individual investor attention on these industry peer effects. Firms’ innovation performance is measured using the number of patent applications by firms during the year, while the number of patent citations is used to measure the quality of firms’ innovations. The empirical findings examine the presence of industry peer effects on innovation among listed firms. The results demonstrate the significant impact of industry peer effects on the innovation of listed firms in the Chinese market. In other words, the innovative activities of firms are notably influenced by the innovation endeavors of other firms within the same industry. Robustness tests are conducted by replacing industry classification criteria, performing placebo tests, and controlling co-investment opportunities. The aforementioned results remain consistent. Second, adopting an “information transmission” perspective, this study explores the impact of investor attention on the innovation peer effects of firms. The empirical results show that investor attention creates innovation pressure on firm management. The analysis of investor communication plays a pivotal role in information disclosure. Both factors encourage firms to glean insights from peer firms, thereby enhancing the industry peer effects of innovation. To address potential endogeneity issues, this study selects the net investor’s attention as the substitute variable to test, and finds that the conclusion is still significant.
   The policy implication of this study’s findings is that the increase in firms’ innovation levels is not only influenced by their independent decision-making or changes in external economic policies but also by the innovation decisions of peer firms. In other words, the peer effects of corporate innovation contribute significantly to the rising innovation levels of listed firms in China. The imitation and learning behavior among these listed firms can drive overall innovation and enhance capital allocation efficiency in the macro-economy, ultimately fostering stable growth in the real economy. Furthermore, investor attention significantly affects both corporate innovation performance and industry peer effects on innovation. Therefore, improving the financial literacy of investors becomes crucial in stimulating social innovation and creativity, establishing a good innovation environment, and enhancing independent innovation to support the healthy and sustainable development of the real economy. This study helps to clarify the relationship among investor attention, corporate innovation, and its peer effects, offering valuable insights into further initiatives to promote corporate innovation and implement innovative development strategies.

Key words: investor attention, peer effect, corporate innovation, listed firms

摘要： 本文基于2004—2018年中国上市公司面板数据以及双向固定效应模型,实证研究了上市公司创新绩效的行业同群效应以及个体投资者关注对创新同群效应的影响。研究表明,其一,上市公司创新的行业同群效应显著存在,在一系列稳健性检验以及排除潜在的内生性问题后,上述结论仍然成立。其二,就其产生机制而言,研究发现投资者关注能够显著调节企业创新的行业同群效应的强度,投资者关注对企业管理层会产生创新压力,并且投资者的交流分析起到信息揭示的作用,以上两种作用共同促进了焦点企业向同群企业进行创新学习,增强创新的行业同群效应。本文有助于厘清投资者关注与企业创新及其同群效应的关系,为正确认识企业创新活动提供了一个新的外部视角,也为进一步激发企业创新和实施创新发展战略具有重要启示。

关键词: 投资者关注, 同群效应, 企业创新, 上市公司