How Corporate Rent-Seeking Affects Outward FDI——Empirical evidence based on A-share listed manufacturing companies

•Corporate rent-seeking significantly increases OFDI,as examined by theoretical mechanisms and empirical tests.•Corporate rent-seeking reduces corporate profitability and induces more corporate OFDI.•Facilitative effect of corporate rent-seeking on OFDI mainly stems from private firms and firms without Political Connection. This study examines the theoretical mechanism of corporate rent-seeking's influence on enterprises' Outward Foreign Direct Investment (OFDI) behavior and empirically tests its impact on OFDI. The results show that corporate rent-seeking increases OFDI significantly. This conclusion is still valid after employing a series of robust analyses. The channel mechanics test finds that corporate rent-seeking reduces enterprise profitability and thereby induces OFDI. Heterogeneity tests find that these effects exist mainly among private enterprise and enterprise without political connection. Our findings enrich the literature on the determinants of OFDI and complement the research on the motivation of internationalization in emerging market countries.