Corporate financial leverage during Vietnam’s 2022 Interest Rate Subsidy Program: Evidence from a bank-based emerging economy
-
DOIhttp://dx.doi.org/10.21511/imfi.23(4).2026.04
-
Article InfoVolume 23 2026, Issue #4, pp. 55–65
- 17 Views
-
4 Downloads
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Type of the article: Research Article
Abstract
In bank-based emerging economies, firms’ financing decisions are closely linked to bank credit conditions and government interventions intended to reduce borrowing costs. Interest rate subsidies may ease access to external finance, yet borrowing responses need not be uniform when firms differ in their financing conditions. This study examines changes in corporate financial leverage during the implementation of Vietnam’s 2022 Interest Rate Subsidy Program and whether these changes vary with firm size. The analysis draws on 1,160 firm-year observations from non-financial firms listed on the Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi stock exchanges between 2016 and 2024. A two-way fixed-effects model with firm-clustered robust standard errors is used, alongside supplementary analyses. The main estimates show that, for a firm of average size, financial leverage was lower in 2022 than in the reference year of 2016. The decline was greater among larger firms, indicating that leverage adjustments differed by firm size. Profitability is negatively associated with leverage, whereas firm size is positively associated with it. The supplementary analyses are consistent with the negative direction of the main association but provide less consistent evidence of size-related differences. These results suggest that lower borrowing costs alone may not be sufficient to increase firms’ use of debt when credit demand and business conditions remain weak. The study adds firm-level evidence on financing behavior during a credit-support intervention in a bank-based emerging economy, although the findings reflect changes during the policy period rather than the standalone effect of the subsidy program.
Acknowledgments
The authors thank Vietstock for providing the financial data used in this study. The authors are solely responsible for the analysis and conclusions presented in this paper.
- Keywords
-
JEL Classification (Paper profile tab)G32, G38, D22, G21
-
References38
-
Tables5
-
Figures1
-
- Figure 1. Flowchart of the research
-
- Table 1. Descriptive statistics for the main variables
- Table 2. Pairwise Pearson correlation matrix
- Table 3. Two-way fixed-effects estimates of corporate financial leverage
- Table 4. Quantile regression results across leverage distribution
- Table 5. Two-way fixed-effects estimates using debt-to-equity leverage
-
- Alter, A., & Elekdag, S. (2020). Emerging market corporate leverage and global financial conditions. Journal of Corporate Finance, 62, Article 101590.
- Beck, T., Demirgüç-Kunt, A., & Maksimovic, V. (2008). Financing patterns around the world: Are small firms different? Journal of Financial Economics, 89(3), 467-487.
- Becker, B., & Ivashina, V. (2014). Cyclicality of credit supply: Firm level evidence. Journal of Monetary Economics, 62, 76-93.
- Berger, A. N., & Udell, G. F. (1995). Relationship lending and lines of credit in small firm finance. Journal of Business, 68(3), 351-381.
- Bernanke, B. S., & Gertler, M. (1995). Inside the black box: The credit channel of monetary policy transmission. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 9(4), 27-48.
- Booth, L., Aivazian, V., Demirgüç-Kunt, A., & Maksimovic, V. (2001). Capital structures in developing countries. The Journal of Finance, 56(1), 87-130.
- De Jong, A., Kabir, R., & Nguyen, T. T. (2008). Capital structure around the world: The roles of firm- and country-specific determinants. Journal of Banking & Finance, 32(9), 1954-1969.
- Deesomsak, R., Paudyal, K., & Pescetto, G. (2004). The determinants of capital structure: Evidence from the Asia Pacific region. Journal of Multinational Financial Management, 14(4-5), 387-405.
- Deghi, A., Seneviratne, D., Tsuruga, T., & Vandenbussche, J. (2021). Corporate funding and the COVID-19 crisis (IMF Working Paper No. 2021/086). International Monetary Fund.
- Didier, T., Huneeus, F., Larrain, M., & Schmukler, S. L. (2021). Financing firms in hibernation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Journal of Financial Stability, 53, Article 100837.
- Fama, E. F., & French, K. R. (2002). Testing trade-off and pecking order predictions about dividends and debt. Review of Financial Studies, 15(1), 1-33.
- Faulkender, M., & Petersen, M. A. (2006). Does the source of capital affect capital structure? Review of Financial Studies, 19(1), 45-79.
- Frank, M. Z., & Goyal, V. K. (2009). Capital structure decisions: Which factors are reliably important? Financial Management, 38(1), 1-37.
- Gertler, M., & Gilchrist, S. (1994). Monetary policy, business cycles, and the behavior of small manufacturing firms. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 109(2), 309-340.
- Haque, S. M., & Varghese, R. (2021). The COVID-19 impact on corporate leverage and financial fragility (IMF Working Paper No. 2021/265). International Monetary Fund.
- Huang, G., & Song, F. M. (2006). The determinants of capital structure: Evidence from China. China Economic Review, 17(1), 14-36.
- Huynh, J., & Phan, T. M. H. (2024). Uncertainty in banking and debt financing of firms in Vietnam. PLOS ONE, 19(7), Article e0305724.
- Jensen, M. C., & Meckling, W. H. (1976). Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure. Journal of Financial Economics, 3(4), 305-360.
- Jiménez, G., Ongena, S., Peydró, J.-L., & Saurina, J. (2012). Credit supply and monetary policy: Identifying the bank balance-sheet channel with loan applications. American Economic Review, 102(5), 2301-2326.
- Jiménez, G., Ongena, S., Peydró, J.-L., & Saurina, J. (2014). Hazardous times for monetary policy: What do twenty-three million bank loans say about the effects of monetary policy on credit risk-taking? Econometrica, 82(2), 463-505.
- Jõeveer, K. (2013). Firm, country and macroeconomic determinants of capital structure: Evidence from transition economies. Journal of Comparative Economics, 41(1), 294-308.
- Karpavičius, S., & Yu, F. (2017). The impact of interest rates on firms’ financing policies. Journal of Corporate Finance, 45, 262-293.
- Korajczyk, R. A., & Levy, A. (2003). Capital structure choice: Macroeconomic conditions and financial constraints. Journal of Financial Economics, 68(1), 75-109.
- Liu, F., & Wang, Z. (2025). Can green credit interest subsidy policy promote corporate green innovation? From the perspective of fiscal and financial policy coordination. Sustainability, 17(21), Article 9750.
- Loi, M. T., & Dang, V. D. (2023). The bank lending channel of monetary policy transmission in Vietnam: Impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and the financial crisis. Cogent Business & Management, 10(1), Article 2199485.
- Mateev, M., Poutziouris, P., & Ivanov, K. (2013). On the determinants of SME capital structure in Central and Eastern Europe: A dynamic panel analysis. Research in International Business and Finance, 27(1), 28-51.
- Myers, S. C. (1984). The capital structure puzzle. The Journal of Finance, 39(3), 575-592.
- Myers, S. C., & Majluf, N. S. (1984). Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have. Journal of Financial Economics, 13(2), 187-221.
- Nguyen, D. T. T., Diaz-Rainey, I., & Gregoriou, A. (2014). Determinants of the capital structure of listed Vietnamese companies. Journal of Southeast Asian Economies, 31(3), 412-431.
- Ornelas, J. R. H., Pedraza, A., Ruiz-Ortega, C., & Silva, T. C. (2024). Market power and the transmission of loan subsidies. The Review of Corporate Finance Studies, 13(4), 931-965.
- Pamungkas, P., Septianto, F., Trinugroho, I., Ab-Rahim, R., Ridhwan, M. M., & Sergi, B. S. (2025). Monetary policy via bank lending channel: Evidence from lending decomposition. Journal of Risk and Financial Management, 18(5), Article 249.
- Rajan, R. G., & Zingales, L. (1995). What do we know about capital structure? Some evidence from international data. The Journal of Finance, 50(5), 1421-1460.
- Sahin, O. (2018). Firm-specific and macroeconomic determinants of capital structure: Evidence from Fragile Five countries. Eurasian Journal of Business and Economics, 11(22), 61-81.
- Stiglitz, J. E., & Weiss, A. (1981). Credit rationing in markets with imperfect information. American Economic Review, 71(3), 393-410.
- Vo, X. V. (2017). Determinants of capital structure in emerging markets: Evidence from Vietnam. Research in International Business and Finance, 40, 105-113.
- Xie, L. X. (2025). Do financially constrained companies increase more leverage during COVID-19? Open Journal of Business and Management, 13(6), 3828-3837.
- Zeitun, R., Temimi, A., & Mimouni, K. (2017). Do financial crises alter the dynamics of corporate capital structure? Evidence from GCC countries. Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, 63, 21-33.
- Zhao, J., & Han, Y. (2025). Interest rate fluctuations and corporate financial leverage. Finance Research Letters, 80, Article 107344.


