Research on the Development and Influence on the Real Economy of Digital Finance: The Case of China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper analyses the impact of digital finance on economic growth at the provincial level (31 provinces) in the Chinese context. For this purpose, the authors first use several PANEL models (GMM, and FE), and then apply a quantile analysis. The paper is well structured, easy to read and offers interesting contributions. However, the PANEL analysis shows a high (perhaps too high) level of R-squared. Therefore, you will ask the authors to:

1. Show the correlation table between variables in order to avoid multicorrelation 

2. Apply the classic tests (normal residuals, heteroskedasticity, and in the case of fixed-effect endogeneity test) to prove the good quality of the analysis 

3. I suggest to the authors (for a future paper) to use spatial econometric models in order to also consider spillover effects between regions

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript is well presented and focus on important issue.

Introduction - There is no general reference to digital finance. There is a lack of a discussion on how the issue of digital finance works (operates) in the world. The authors generally focused only on China, but the problem is wider. In this case, the discussion should be depth. What's new in the study? There was no research gap.

References - schould include more relevant world literature. 

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx