Research Achievement by Zhang Bo's Team Published in Authoritative Journal

Recently, the research achievement Fintech, Financial Inclusion and Illegal Fundraising Risk by Associate Professor Zhang Bo from the School of Economics, Shandong University, Zhang Xiaofan (a 2024 doctoral graduate, now at Shandong Branch of China Agricultural Development Bank), and doctoral candidate Cai Ziyang was published in the 1st issue of 2025 of Journal of Financial Research, an authoritative journal. This paper is one of the phased achievements of the team's series of research around the "five major articles" of finance.

Preventing and defusing financial risks, especially preventing systemic financial risks, is the fundamental task of financial work and the eternal theme of financial work. The 2023 Central Financial Work Conference proposed to do a good job in the five major articles of technology finance, green finance, inclusive finance, elderly care finance, and digital finance, comprehensively strengthen financial supervision, effectively prevent and defuse financial risks, and severely crack down on illegal financial activities. In recent years, illegal fundraising, as a typical illegal financial activity, has attracted great social attention. It not only seriously disrupts economic and financial market order and easily triggers systemic financial risks, but also threatens social stability. Therefore, deeply understanding the economic root causes of illegal fundraising, especially the role of fintech emerging under the background of the deep integration of technology and finance in illegal fundraising activities, has become an important practical issue related to the vital interests of the public and economic and financial order.

Based on the judgment documents of illegal fundraising cases and China Household Finance Survey data, this paper uses machine learning methods to identify the number of fintech patent applications, and tests the impact of fintech development on illegal fundraising risk and its mechanism. The study shows that fintech development can significantly reduce the number of illegal fundraising cases and defendants per million people. Fintech mainly improves financial inclusion through data analysis technology innovation, eases the credit constraints faced by individuals, improves their financial knowledge, reduces financing and investment financial exclusion, thereby reducing illegal fundraising risk. This paper not only expands the relevant research on the economic effects of fintech development and the determinants of illegal fundraising risk, but also provides a theoretical basis for the policy of "combining dredging and blocking, addressing both symptoms and root causes" that cracking down on illegal fundraising should adhere to prevention first and eliminate economic incentives.

Zhang Bo is an Associate Professor at the School of Economics, Shandong University. His research directions are inclusive finance, culture and finance, and Chinese financial history. He has presided over national and provincial-level projects such as general and youth projects of the National Natural Science Foundation of China and youth projects of the Humanities and Social Sciences Fund of the Ministry of Education. His research achievements have been published in authoritative journals such as Journal of Financial Research, China Economic Quarterly, China Industrial Economics, Economica, and Journal of Banking & Finance. He has won the Second Prize and Third Prize of Shandong Provincial Social Science Excellent Achievements many times, and his policy consulting reports have received affirmative instructions from major leaders of Shandong Provincial Party Committee and Provincial Government or been adopted by the Ministry of Education.