Abstract: Government public data opening is a crucial initiative for advancing data circulation and sharing, strengthening the competitiveness of the digital industry, and fostering the ecosystem for digital economic growth. Using the data from A-share listed companies from 2007 to 2023, this paper studies the impact of government public data opening on corporate risk-taking. The findings suggest that government public data opening can increase corporate risk-taking levels, with the effect being more pronounced when the quality of data opening is higher. The mechanism analysis reveals that government public data opening can optimize the governance mechanism of enterprises, alleviate financing constraints, and expand the physical investment space of enterprises. Therefore, government public data opening can improve the risk-taking level of enterprises. The heterogeneity analysis demonstrates that the effect of government public data opening on corporate risk-taking is especially pronounced in the enterprises with higher levels of digital transformation, limited analyst coverage, and lower information disclosure quality. Therefore, it is essential to improve the public data opening system and enhance the quality of government data opening.

Key words: government public data opening, corporate risk-taking, corporate governance, financing constraints, real investment space