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Optimal Capital Structure with Endogenous Default and Volatility Risk

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  • Flavia Barsotti

    (Dipartimento di Matematica per le Decisioni, Universita' degli Studi di Firenze)

Abstract

This paper analyzes the capital structure of a firm in an infinite time horizon following Leland (1994) under the more general hypothesis that the firm’s assets value process belongs to a fairly large class of stochastic volatility models. By applying singular perturbation theory, we fully describe the (approximate) capital structure of the firm in closed form as a corrected version of Leland (1994) and analyze the stochastic volatility effect on all financial variables. We propose a corrected version of the smooth-fit principle under volatility risk useful to determine the optimal stopping problem solution (i.e. endogenous failure level) and a corrected version for the Laplace transform of the stopping failure time. The numerical analysis obtained from exploiting optimal capital structure shows enhanced spreads and lower leverage ratios w.r.t. Leland (1994), improving results in a robust model-independent way.

Suggested Citation

  • Flavia Barsotti, 2012. "Optimal Capital Structure with Endogenous Default and Volatility Risk," Working Papers - Mathematical Economics 2012-02, Universita' degli Studi di Firenze, Dipartimento di Scienze per l'Economia e l'Impresa.
    • Handle: RePEc:flo:wpaper:2012-02
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Lotfaliei, Babak, 2018. "The variance risk premium and capital structure," ESRB Working Paper Series 70, European Systemic Risk Board.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    structural model; stochastic volatility; volatility time scales; endogenous default; optimal stopping;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G13 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Contingent Pricing; Futures Pricing
    • G33 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Bankruptcy; Liquidation

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