Abstract: How to motivate management to maximize the value of the enterprise is the key part of corporate governance. The paper examines the relation between promotion-based tournament incentives of chief financial officer (CFO) and corporate tax aggressiveness based on the data of A- share listed companies in China in 2009-2015, finding the greater the incentive for CFO to be given to the tournament, the greater the degree of corporate tax aggressiveness; compared to non-state owned enterprises, the effect of state owned enterprises′ tournament incentive on tax radical degree is more obvious.

Key words: tournament incentives, position promotion, corporate tax aggressiveness