Abstract: In the context of the implementation of the new enterprise income tax law since 2008, this paper takes the A-share listed companies from 2003 to 2012 as the research objects to conduct an empirical study of the relationship between tax rate adjustment, corporate tax avoidance and enterprise value. The findings suggest that: (1) after the tax reform, the companies with increased tax rate would significantly improve the degree of tax avoidance, while the companies with decreased tax rate would have significantly lowered degree of tax avoidance, and the companies without changes of tax rate would remain the same as usual; (2) within the five years after the tax reform, the companies with increased tax rate present an inverted U-shape change of tax avoidance, reaching the peak in the third year, while the companies with decreased tax rate would decrease their tax avoidance year after year during this period; (3) the correlation between corporate tax avoidance behavior and enterprise value is affected by the income tax rate applied to the enterprises, which is further affected by the direction of tax rate adjustment during the tax reform. After the tax reform, the companies with increased tax rate would significantly reduce enterprise value due to their tax avoidance behaviors, while the companies with decreased tax rate would significantly increase enterprise value due to their tax avoidance behaviors. Therefore, the tax rate adjustment can produce a certain degree of impact on the investors’ value judgment of enterprise tax avoidance.

Key words: tax rate adjustment; corporate tax avoidance; enterprise value