IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jfinin/v60y2024ics1042957324000469.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The costs of corporate debt overhang

Author

Listed:
  • Blickle, Kristian
  • Santos, João A.C.

Abstract

We make use of rich U.S. data to show that debt overhang significantly reduces firm asset-, capex-, and employee-growth. We show these contractions are likely driven by firm decisions as opposed to the result of credit constraints or changes in investment opportunities. Our measure of overhang – liabilities to cash flow — aligns with traditional theory and focuses on the importance of a firm’s debt servicing capacity. It further allows us to capitalize on the COVID-19 shock as a quasi-natural experiment to confirm the impact of overhang on firm investment and growth.

Suggested Citation

  • Blickle, Kristian & Santos, João A.C., 2024. "The costs of corporate debt overhang," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jfinin:v:60:y:2024:i:c:s1042957324000469
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jfi.2024.101118
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1042957324000469
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jfi.2024.101118?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.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Debt overhang; External funding; Covid-19;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G20 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - General
    • G28 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • G30 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - 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:jfinin:v:60:y:2024:i:c:s1042957324000469. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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/inca/622875 .

    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.