Geopolitical events have been of increasing concern for many firms as they represent a source of disruption. In this paper, we contend that these concerns can lead to changes in the supply network. By adopting the PSM-DID method, we examine how buying firms reconfigure their supply network to seek resilience based on changes driven by geopolitical events from an institutional distance perspective. Based on data analysis from 368 companies, we found that if firms were affected by the US-China trade war, the regulatory institutional distance between themselves and their overseas supply network would be significantly decreased after the trade war. In addition, we also find that the change would be more severe if buying firms had a higher perception of political risk before the trade war took place or if there was a greater regulatory institutional distance between themselves and their internal network before the trade war took place.
