["The Developing Economies, EarlyView. ", "\nABSTRACT\nDo political leaders play a role in shaping economic outcomes? Can we quantify and compare the economic influence of contemporary political leaders? This paper examines the economic impact of autocratic leadership through the lens of firm visits in China, offering a unique empirical strategy to assess their influence. Drawing on an original dataset of visits made by four top Chinese leaders to publicly listed firms from 2002 to 2022, we apply an event study analysis to estimate both the short‐ and long‐term effects of these visits on firm value and performance. We find that visits by top leaders generate significant cumulative abnormal returns (1.26%–5.97%), with notable variation across individual leaders and their terms in office. Strikingly, private firms experienced a substantial increase in bank loans following visits by Xi Jinping, the current leader, an effect not observed for visits by other leaders. These findings demonstrate that, even in institutionalized authoritarian regimes, top‐level political signaling plays a consequential role in shaping firm behavior and market expectations. This study contributes to debates on state‐business relations and economic governance under autocratic leadership.\n"]