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PurposeThis paper attributes the clustered occurrence of over-guarantee crises of Chinese listed firms to behavioural interactions among them when engaged in guarantee decisions, verifying the existence of the peer effect (PE) and its role in the formation mechanism of such crises.Design/methodology/approachReviewing the literature, the authors constructed a panel dataset of Chinese listed firms from 2011 to 2019 to empirically verify two types of PE by constructing industrial and regional PE indicators. The authors conduct grouped regressions according to firm heterogeneity and managers’ individual characteristics to explain the motives for the over-guaranteeing PE and also analysed the interaction between the financial market and the PE to reveal the external governance mechanism.FindingsThe authors find that the over-guarantee behaviour of Chinese listed firms exhibits strong industrial and regional correlations, which may lead to guarantee crises clustering. Firms with lower information quality, smaller asset size, and higher managerial overconfidence will be more likely to be influenced by other listed firms to over-guarantee. A favourable financial market environment can effectively inhibit listed firms from imitating the guaranteeing behaviour of peer firms.Research limitations/implicationsThis study’s results challenge the traditional theoretical perspective of independent financial decision-making, describe the interaction among listed firms in decision-making, and expand the existing theoretical literature on over-guaranteeing. The stickiness of guarantee behaviour may affect the accuracy of the authors’ estimations, and the differences between the industrial and regional PE require further research.Practical implicationsThe PE of over-guaranteeing shows that a single firm has a “spill-over effect” on the guarantee decisions of other firms in the same industry or region. Improving the information environment of listed firms financing decision-making and establishing a more demanding guarantee access mechanism may reduce this dependence on listed firms’ decisions. Firms should also appropriately strengthen decision-making constraints on managers to avoid istortions in financial decisions due to managers’ personal cognitive biases.Originality/valueUsing PE theory, the authors explain the influence mechanisms of financial distress of Chinese listed firms due to industrial and regional clustering of over-guarantee behaviour from the perspective of behavioural interaction.

We study the impact of a unique financial anomaly—the simultaneous persistence of greater cash holdings and interest‐bearing debts (SP‐GCHID) on stock price. Due to institutional diversity and the nature of transition economies, high cash holdings do not always stem from precautionary motive as usually claimed but can be the result of cash misappropriation and debt manipulation by major shareholders. Analysing data from Chinese listed firms from 2010 to 2018, we find that SP‐GCHID is associated with a higher stock price crash risk (SPCR). It is more evident among firms with major shareholders pledging their shares and firms exposed to more external information monitoring. SP‐GCHID also affects SPCR through increasing real earnings management, further suggesting that major shareholders' misappropriation is the main reason for SP‐GCHID's adverse effect. These findings are also robust in a range of endogenous tests. To our knowledge, this study is the first to explore the economic consequences of SP‐GCHID.