Asymmetric Adjustment Toward Optimal Capital Structure

Asymmetric Adjustment Toward Optimal Capital Structure PDF Author: Viet Anh Dang
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 55

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Book Description
We employ dynamic threshold partial adjustment models to study the asymmetries in firms' adjustments toward their target leverage. Using a sample of US firms over the period 2002-2012, we document a negative impact of the Global Financial Crisis on the speed of leverage adjustment. In our subperiod analysis, we find moderate evidence of cross-sectional heterogeneity in this speed, which seems more pronounced pre-crisis and provides little support for the financial constraint view. Over the pre-crisis period, more constrained firms, such as those with high growth, with large investment, of small size, and with volatile earnings, adjust their capital structures more quickly than their less constrained counterparts. These firms rely heavily on external funds to offset large financing deficits, suggesting that their higher adjustment speeds may be driven by lower adjustment costs that are shared with the transaction costs of accessing external capital markets. During the crisis, the speed of adjustment varies with the deviation from target leverage: only firms with sufficiently large deviations attempt to revert to the target, albeit slowly. Overall, our results provide new evidence of both cross-sectional and time-varying asymmetries in capital structure adjustments, which is consistent with the trade-off theory.

Asymmetric Adjustment Toward Optimal Capital Structure

Asymmetric Adjustment Toward Optimal Capital Structure PDF Author: Viet Anh Dang
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 55

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Book Description
We employ dynamic threshold partial adjustment models to study the asymmetries in firms' adjustments toward their target leverage. Using a sample of US firms over the period 2002-2012, we document a negative impact of the Global Financial Crisis on the speed of leverage adjustment. In our subperiod analysis, we find moderate evidence of cross-sectional heterogeneity in this speed, which seems more pronounced pre-crisis and provides little support for the financial constraint view. Over the pre-crisis period, more constrained firms, such as those with high growth, with large investment, of small size, and with volatile earnings, adjust their capital structures more quickly than their less constrained counterparts. These firms rely heavily on external funds to offset large financing deficits, suggesting that their higher adjustment speeds may be driven by lower adjustment costs that are shared with the transaction costs of accessing external capital markets. During the crisis, the speed of adjustment varies with the deviation from target leverage: only firms with sufficiently large deviations attempt to revert to the target, albeit slowly. Overall, our results provide new evidence of both cross-sectional and time-varying asymmetries in capital structure adjustments, which is consistent with the trade-off theory.

Heterogeneity and Asymmetry in Speed of Leverage Adjustment

Heterogeneity and Asymmetry in Speed of Leverage Adjustment PDF Author: Surenderrao Komera
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
In this paper, we examine firms' capital structure adjustment behavior and estimate their "speed of adjustment" toward optimal leverage ratios by employing a dynamic, partial adjustment model. We find that sample firms on an average offset half of the deviation from their target leverage ratios in less than one and half (1.41) years. Such evidence suggests optimal capital structure behavior among sample firms. Further, we report cross sectional heterogeneity and asymmetry in speed of adjustment estimates, resulting from varied leverage adjustment costs across the sample firms. We find higher speed of adjustment estimates among larger sample firms suggesting higher leverage adjustment costs for smaller firms. Business group affiliation does not seem to influence the costs of sample firms' leverage adjustment. Over-levered firms report higher speed of adjustment estimates, suggesting that sample firms do not consider debt financing as a "disciplining mechanism" for managers. Further, we find lower speed of adjustment estimates for sample firms with higher cash flow, implying that Indian markets do not actively accommodate firms' cash flow needs. Thus, our findings reveal complex asymmetric information problems and consequent varied leverage adjustment costs among emerging market firms.

Optimal Capital Structure of Firms Under Asymmetric Information

Optimal Capital Structure of Firms Under Asymmetric Information PDF Author: Paolo Fulghieri
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description


Empirical Capital Structure

Empirical Capital Structure PDF Author: Christopher Parsons
Publisher: Now Publishers Inc
ISBN: 160198202X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 107

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Book Description
Empirical Capital Structure reviews the empirical capital structure literature from both the cross-sectional determinants of capital structure as well as time-series changes.

Capital Structure Puzzle

Capital Structure Puzzle PDF Author: Stewart C. Myers
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Corporations
Languages : en
Pages : 46

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Book Description
This paper contrasts the "static tradeoff" and "pecking order" theories of capital structure choice by corporations. In the static tradeoff theory, optimal capital structure is reached when the tax advantage to borrowing is balanced, at the margin, by costs of financial distress. In the pecking order theory, firms preferinternal to external funds, and debt to equity if external funds are needed. Thus the debt ratio reflects the cumulative requirement for external financing. Pecking order behavior follows from simple asymmetric information models. The paper closes with a review of empirical evidence relevant to the two theories.

The Benefits of Adjusting - Estimating the Speed of Adjustment Toward a Target Capital Structure on a Cost Basis

The Benefits of Adjusting - Estimating the Speed of Adjustment Toward a Target Capital Structure on a Cost Basis PDF Author: Brian J. Clark
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 55

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Book Description
I estimate the speed of adjustment toward a target capital structure on a cost basis. Whereas other papers test for mean reversion of leverage ratios, I test for mean reversion in the opportunity cost of being away from a target capital structure. The primary benefit of this approach is that the opportunity cost provides a direct link between changes in capital structure and changes in firm value and allows me to quantify the economic benefit of a given speed of adjustment policy as a percent of firm value. The mean firm saves about 3.3% of total assets by following the estimated speed of adjustment policy of 47.3% vis-à-vis a random financing policy. However, firms would not realize any significant gain (less than 0.40% to total assets) by changing their policy from the observed to a policy of complete adjustment. As such, firms appear to be not only adjusting toward optimal capital structures in a meaningful way but also optimizing the speed at which they adjust.

Testing Static Trade-off Against Pecking Order Models of Capital Structure

Testing Static Trade-off Against Pecking Order Models of Capital Structure PDF Author: Lakshmi Shyam-Sunder
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Corporate debt
Languages : en
Pages : 48

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Book Description
This paper tests traditional capital structure models against the alternative of a pecking order model of corporate financing. The basic pecking order model, which predicts external debt financing driven by the internal financial deficit, has much greater explanatory power than a static trade-off model which predicts that each firm adjusts toward an optimal debt ratio. We show that the power of some usual tests of the trade-off model is virtually nil. We question whether the available empirical evidence supports the notion of an optimal debt ratio.

Dynamic Optimal Capital Structure and Technological Change

Dynamic Optimal Capital Structure and Technological Change PDF Author: Hans Lööf
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 31

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Book Description
This paper incorporates the cost of adjustment between observed and optimal leverage in explaining the variation in firm's equity or bank-debt financing investments. Using a dynamic adjustment approach identifies the determinants to capital structure between different financial systems. In relation to firm sales U.K and U.S firms have 50-100 percent more equity financing than Swedish firms depending on which measure used, while the ratio of debt to sales is highest in Sweden. The major findings are that observed leverage often deviates from the target leverage in both equity and debt dominated systems. There are large and also unexpected crosscountry differences in determinants to optimal capital structure. Swedish and U.K. firms deviate more from the optimal level than U.S firms. A faster speed towards the target is observed in the equity based systems.

Theories of Optimal Capital Structure

Theories of Optimal Capital Structure PDF Author: Oliver Hart
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 35

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Book Description
In the thirty or so years since the Modigliani-Miller theorem, scholars have worked to relax the theorem's assumptions in order to obtain a better understanding of the capital structure of firms. This work has produced some important insights but has not yet delivered a fully coherent theory of optimal capital structure. For example, at present we do not understand very well the distinguishing features of debt and equity or why these claims, as opposed to the many instruments that could be chosen, are most frequently issued by firms. Given this state of affairs, existing explanations of the debt-equity ratio must be seem as still preliminary, as must efforts to use these explanations to understand global trends such as the large increases in leverage in the United States and United Kingdom during the 1980s.In the first part of this paper, I will argue that one reason progress on understanding capital structure has been limited is that relatively few analysts have adopted an explicit agency-theoretic or managerial discretion perspective. In particular, although the literature, starting with the work of Michael Jensen and William Meckling, frequently refers to conflicts of interest, most of it does not emphasize the conflict of interest between a firm's management and its security holders. But I argue that this particular conflict of interest - that is, the idea that management is self-interested - is critical. In the absence of this conflict, optimal capital structure would look very different from what is observed in the world. In particular, firms would not issue senior or secured debt, whereas in fact a considerable amount of corporate debt has at least one of these features. That is, standard departures from the Modigliani-Miller framework that focus on the role of taxes, asymmetric information, or incomplete markets but ignore managerial self-interest are not sufficient to explain observed capital structure.In the second part of the analysis I will discuss what has been learned from the relatively few studies that have explicitly adopted an agency-theoretic perspective. This body of work, although itself quite preliminary, can explain the use of senior or secured debt or both, as well as shed light on some observe patterns of capital structure, including a number of findings from studies that measure the response of security prices to important events that affect optimal capital structure (quot;event studiesquot;).

Corporate Debt Capacity

Corporate Debt Capacity PDF Author: Gordon Donaldson
Publisher: Beard Books
ISBN: 9781587980343
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 316

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Book Description