IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/corfin/v17y2011i5p1457-1474.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Firm- and country-level determinants of corporate leverage: Some new international evidence

Author

Listed:
  • Gungoraydinoglu, Ali
  • Öztekin, Özde

Abstract

This research analyzes the determinants of capital structure across 37 countries. Institutional arrangements matter for capital structure decisions; however, firm-level covariates drive two-thirds of the variation in capital structure across countries, while the country-level covariates explain the remaining one-third. The observed relationships between the country-level determinants and leverage provide strong support to the predictions of both the trade-off and the pecking-order theories. Country-level determinants serve as substitute mechanisms for the firm-level, industry-level, and macroeconomic determinants by moderating their marginal impact on leverage.

Suggested Citation

  • Gungoraydinoglu, Ali & Öztekin, Özde, 2011. "Firm- and country-level determinants of corporate leverage: Some new international evidence," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 1457-1474.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:corfin:v:17:y:2011:i:5:p:1457-1474
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jcorpfin.2011.08.004
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0929119911000964
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jcorpfin.2011.08.004?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hovakimian, Armen & Opler, Tim & Titman, Sheridan, 2001. "The Debt-Equity Choice," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 36(1), pages 1-24, March.
    2. Simeon Djankov & Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Andrei Shleifer, 2002. "The Regulation of Entry," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(1), pages 1-37.
    3. Andrei Shleifer & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Rafael La Porta, 2008. "The Economic Consequences of Legal Origins," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 46(2), pages 285-332, June.
    4. Myers, Stewart C. & Majluf, Nicholas S., 1984. "Corporate financing and investment decisions when firms have information that investors do not have," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 187-221, June.
    5. Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez‐De‐Silanes & Andrei Shleifer, 2006. "What Works in Securities Laws?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(1), pages 1-32, February.
    6. Stewart C. Myers & Nicholas S. Majluf, 1984. "Corporate Financing and Investment Decisions When Firms Have InformationThat Investors Do Not Have," NBER Working Papers 1396, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Huang, Rongbing & Ritter, Jay R., 2009. "Testing Theories of Capital Structure and Estimating the Speed of Adjustment," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(2), pages 237-271, April.
    8. Hanousek, Jan & Shamshur, Anastasiya, 2011. "A stubborn persistence: Is the stability of leverage ratios determined by the stability of the economy?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 1360-1376.
    9. Simeon Djankov & Oliver Hart & Caralee McLiesh & Andrei Shleifer, 2008. "Debt Enforcement around the World," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 116(6), pages 1105-1149, December.
    10. Djankov, Simeon & McLiesh, Caralee & Shleifer, Andrei, 2007. "Private credit in 129 countries," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(2), pages 299-329, May.
    11. Giannetti, Mariassunta, 2003. "Do Better Institutions Mitigate Agency Problems? Evidence from Corporate Finance Choices," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 38(1), pages 185-212, March.
    12. Murray Z. Frank & Vidhan K. Goyal, 2009. "Capital Structure Decisions: Which Factors Are Reliably Important?," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 38(1), pages 1-37, March.
    13. Simeon Djankov & Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez-de-Silane & Andrei Shleifer, 2002. "Courts: the Lex Mundi Project," NBER Working Papers 8890, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. J B Heaton, 2002. "Managerial Optimism and Corporate Finance," Financial Management, Financial Management Association, vol. 31(2), Summer.
    15. Demirguc-Kunt, Asli & Maksimovic, Vojislav, 1999. "Institutions, financial markets, and firm debt maturity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(3), pages 295-336, December.
    16. Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1986. "Large Shareholders and Corporate Control," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(3), pages 461-488, June.
    17. Eugene F. Fama, 2002. "Testing Trade-Off and Pecking Order Predictions About Dividends and Debt," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 15(1), pages 1-33, March.
    18. Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Andrei Shleifer & Robert W. Vishny, 1998. "Law and Finance," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(6), pages 1113-1155, December.
    19. Jensen, Michael C. & Meckling, William H., 1976. "Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 305-360, October.
    20. Blundell, Richard & Bond, Stephen, 1998. "Initial conditions and moment restrictions in dynamic panel data models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 87(1), pages 115-143, August.
    21. Laurence Booth & Varouj Aivazian & Asli Demirguc‐Kunt & Vojislav Maksimovic, 2001. "Capital Structures in Developing Countries," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(1), pages 87-130, February.
    22. Flannery, Mark J. & Rangan, Kasturi P., 2006. "Partial adjustment toward target capital structures," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(3), pages 469-506, March.
    23. Richard Lambert & Christian Leuz & Robert E. Verrecchia, 2007. "Accounting Information, Disclosure, and the Cost of Capital," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(2), pages 385-420, May.
    24. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1997. "Industry costs of equity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 153-193, February.
    25. Myers, Stewart C., 1984. "Capital structure puzzle," Working papers 1548-84., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Sloan School of Management.
    26. Stulz, ReneM., 1990. "Managerial discretion and optimal financing policies," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 3-27, July.
    27. Djankov, Simeon & La Porta, Rafael & Lopez-de-Silanes, Florencio & Shleifer, Andrei, 2008. "The law and economics of self-dealing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(3), pages 430-465, June.
    28. Simeon Djankov & Tim Ganser & Caralee McLiesh & Rita Ramalho & Andrei Shleifer, 2010. "The Effect of Corporate Taxes on Investment and Entrepreneurship," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(3), pages 31-64, July.
    29. Rajan, Raghuram G & Zingales, Luigi, 1995. "What Do We Know about Capital Structure? Some Evidence from International Data," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(5), pages 1421-1460, December.
    30. Jensen, Michael C, 1986. "Agency Costs of Free Cash Flow, Corporate Finance, and Takeovers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(2), pages 323-329, May.
    31. Cook, Douglas O. & Tang, Tian, 2010. "Macroeconomic conditions and capital structure adjustment speed," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 73-87, February.
    32. Myers, Stewart C, 1984. "The Capital Structure Puzzle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 39(3), pages 575-592, July.
    33. Ilya A. Strebulaev, 2007. "Do Tests of Capital Structure Theory Mean What They Say?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(4), pages 1747-1787, August.
    34. Michael L. Lemmon & Michael R. Roberts & Jaime F. Zender, 2008. "Back to the Beginning: Persistence and the Cross‐Section of Corporate Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(4), pages 1575-1608, August.
    35. Verrecchia, Robert E., 2001. "Essays on disclosure," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-3), pages 97-180, December.
    36. Antoniou, Antonios & Guney, Yilmaz & Paudyal, Krishna, 2008. "The Determinants of Capital Structure: Capital Market-Oriented versus Bank-Oriented Institutions," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 43(1), pages 59-92, March.
    37. Stewart C. Myers, 1984. "Capital Structure Puzzle," NBER Working Papers 1393, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    38. Jun Qian & Philip E. Strahan, 2007. "How Laws and Institutions Shape Financial Contracts: The Case of Bank Loans," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(6), pages 2803-2834, December.
    39. Hovakimian, Armen & Li, Guangzhong, 2011. "In search of conclusive evidence: How to test for adjustment to target capital structure," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 33-44, February.
    40. Korajczyk, Robert A. & Levy, Amnon, 2003. "Capital structure choice: macroeconomic conditions and financial constraints," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 75-109, April.
    41. Myers, Stewart C., 1977. "Determinants of corporate borrowing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(2), pages 147-175, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Öztekin, Özde & Flannery, Mark J., 2012. "Institutional determinants of capital structure adjustment speeds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(1), pages 88-112.
    2. Antonczyk, Ron Christian & Salzmann, Astrid Juliane, 2014. "Overconfidence and optimism: The effect of national culture on capital structure," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 132-151.
    3. An, Zhe & Chen, Chen & Li, Donghui & Yin, Chao, 2021. "Foreign institutional ownership and the speed of leverage adjustment: International evidence," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    4. Dang, Viet Anh & Kim, Minjoo & Shin, Yongcheol, 2014. "Asymmetric adjustment toward optimal capital structure: Evidence from a crisis," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 226-242.
    5. Mohamed, Hisham Hanifa & Masih, Mansur & Bacha, Obiyathulla I., 2015. "Why do issuers issue Sukuk or conventional bond? Evidence from Malaysian listed firms using partial adjustment models," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 233-252.
    6. Mário Santos & António Moreira & Elisabete Vieira, 2014. "Ownership concentration, contestability, family firms, and capital structure," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 18(4), pages 1063-1107, November.
    7. An, Zhe & Li, Donghui & Yu, Jin, 2016. "Earnings management, capital structure, and the role of institutional environments," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 131-152.
    8. Ebrahim, M. Shahid & Girma, Sourafel & Shah, M. Eskandar & Williams, Jonathan, 2014. "Dynamic capital structure and political patronage: The case of Malaysia," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 117-128.
    9. Wolfgang Drobetz & Dirk C. Schilling & Henning Schröder, 2015. "Heterogeneity in the Speed of Capital Structure Adjustment across Countries and over the Business Cycle," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 21(5), pages 936-973, November.
    10. İbrahim Yarba & Z. Nuray Güner, 2020. "Leverage dynamics: Do financial development and government leverage matter? Evidence from a major developing economy," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 59(5), pages 2473-2507, November.
    11. Giorgio Canarella & Stephen M. Miller, 2019. "Determinants of Optimal Capital Structure and Speed of Adjustment: Evidence from the U.S. ICT Sector," Working papers 2019-06, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics.
    12. Belkhir, Mohamed & Maghyereh, Aktham & Awartani, Basel, 2016. "Institutions and corporate capital structure in the MENA region," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 99-129.
    13. Çolak, Gönül & Gungoraydinoglu, Ali & Öztekin, Özde, 2018. "Global leverage adjustments, uncertainty, and country institutional strength," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 35(PA), pages 41-56.
    14. Pinto, João M. & Silva, Cátia S., 2021. "Does export intensity affect corporate leverage? Evidence from Portuguese SMEs," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 38(C).
    15. Kuang Kuang Deng & Siu Kei Wong & Kwong Wing Chau, 2018. "Institutions and Capital Structure: The Case of Chinese Property Firms," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 56(3), pages 352-385, April.
    16. Amini, Shahram & Elmore, Ryan & Öztekin, Özde & Strauss, Jack, 2021. "Can machines learn capital structure dynamics?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    17. Ampenberger, Markus & Schmid, Thomas & Achleitner, Ann-Kristin & Kaserer, Christoph, 2009. "Capital structure decisions in family firms: empirical evidence from a bank-based economy," CEFS Working Paper Series 2009-05, Technische Universität München (TUM), Center for Entrepreneurial and Financial Studies (CEFS).
    18. Marco Botta & Luca Vittorio Angelo Colombo, 2022. "Non‐linear capital structure dynamics," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(9-10), pages 1897-1928, October.
    19. Yildirim, Ramazan & Masih, Mansur & Bacha, Obiyathulla Ismath, 2018. "Determinants of capital structure: evidence from Shari'ah compliant and non-compliant firms," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 198-219.
    20. San Martín, Pablo & Saona, Paolo, 2017. "Capital structure in the Chilean corporate sector: Revisiting the stylized facts," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 163-174.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Dynamic capital structure; International; Institutions; Trade-off; Pecking-order;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G20 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - General
    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:corfin:v:17:y:2011:i:5:p:1457-1474. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jcorpfin .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.