Conclusion and implications
Some researchers are beginning to pay attention to the consequences of EPU, but they are mainly focusing on how it influences the macro-economic development and investment decisions of enterprises, while the mechanisms through which commercial banks deliver the effects of macro-economic policies on enterprises are overlooked. Our research fills this gap by investigating whether and how EPU affects the operational behavior of enterprises. Our results show that EPU can increase NPLR, SBCLR and NLMR, and adversely affect the loan sizes of commercial banks by shocking enterprises’ demand for and banks’ supply of credit resources, particularly in joint-stock commercial banks. When faced with an increase in EPU, banks can improve performance by reducing loan sizes. Marketization levels and financial development depth can also be used to modulate the effects of EPU on commercial banks. Our results have the following implications. First, to lower the information asymmetry between commercial banks and raise the efficiency of credit resource allocation, governments should pay more attention to improving the opacity, smoothness, consistency and enforceability of economic policies. Second, commercial banks should pay more attention to the dynamic adjustment of risk management indicators and lending decisions based on changes in economic policies to balance security, liquidity and profitability when serving the real economy.
