Can green credit inhibit regional carbon emissions? evidence from China

During the inhibition path of carbon emissions, the role of green finance is of increasing concerns, among which, green credit is regarded as crucial instrument. However, there exist insufficient empirical explorations on effects of green credit. Therefore, this study introduced intergovernmental panel on climate change method to calculate regional carbon emissions based on eight fossil fuels from 2008 to 2019 in China. Subsequently, spatial measurement, threshold regression, and intermediary model were further applied to examine how green credit may affect carbon emissions regarding the restraining effect, threshold effect, transmission mechanism, and spatial heterogeneity. The results show that: (1) green credit can effectively inhibited China's provincial carbon emissions although there existed regional inconsistency. (2) Appropriate levels of environmental regulation and marketization can enhance the repress effect of green credit. (3) Green credit can suppress provincial carbon emissions through optimizing the energy consumption structure, while there exists no intermediary effect of industrial structure upgrading during impact path. (4) Considering endogeneity, green credit can still significantly inhibit regional carbon emissions. These findings further enrich the current literature and provide references for policy design of constructing efficient carbon neutralization path. © The Author(s) 2023.