This paper studies whether there is a connection between finance and growth at the firm level. It employs a new dataset of 150,165 equity and bond issuances around the world, matched with income and balance sheet data for 62,653 listed firms in 65 countries over 1990–2016. Three main patterns emerge from the analyses. First, firms that choose to issue in capital markets use the funds raised to grow by enhancing their productive capabilities, increasing their tangible and intangible capital and the number of employees. Growth accelerates as firms raise funds. Second, the faster growth is more pronounced among firms that are more likely to face tighter financing constraints, namely, small, young, and high-R&D firms. Third, capital market issuances are associated with faster growth among firms located in countries with more developed capital markets relative to banks. Capital markets are also comparatively effective at allowing financially constrained firms to raise capital.

本文研究了在公司层面上财务与增长之间是否存在联系。它采用了一个包含全球 150,165 次股票和债券发行的新数据集，并与 1990 年至 2016 年间 65 个国家/地区的 62,653 家上市公司的收入和资产负债表数据相匹配。分析中出现了三种主要模式。首先，选择在资本市场上发行的公司通过提高生产能力、增加有形和无形资本以及员工数量来利用筹集的资金实现增长。随着公司筹集资金，增长加速。其次，在更可能面临更严格融资约束的企业，即小型、年轻和高研发企业中，更快的增长更为明显。第三，资本市场发行与位于资本市场相对于银行更发达的国家的公司增长更快有关。资本市场在允许财务受限的公司筹集资金方面也相对有效。