Transformations  in
Business & Economics

CAN IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF INFORMATION DISCLOSURE WEAKEN THE PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY DISCRIMINATION IN THE P2P LENDING MARKET?
Lei Zhao, Rangkun Qi

ABSTRACT. Identity discrimination has received considerable attention in the financial market but existing studies have neglected the possibility of professional identity discrimination in the peer to peer (P2P) lending market. This possibility was explored by analysing the relationship between information disclosure quality and professional identity discrimination as well as the risk identification ability and operation efficiency in the P2P market with the micro transaction data of China's "Ren Ren Dai" P2P lending platform from 2014 to 2015. Results show that currently China's P2P lending market has low information disclosure quality and significant professional identity discrimination. After considering the heterogeneity of borrowers and the difference in borrowing amount, the improvement in information disclosure quality can effectively alleviate professional identity discrimination and improve the operational efficiency of the P2P lending market. The conclusions can provide certain decision support for improving the credit authentication mechanism in the P2P lending market and controlling Internet financial risks .

KEYWORDS:  P2P, professional identity discrimination, information disclosure quality.

JEL classification:  D53, G14, G41.