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How much is too much? Debt capacity and financial flexibility

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  • Hess, Dieter
  • Immenkötter, Philipp

Abstract

We estimate the debt capacity of a firm as the critical debt ratio that causes a downgrade in creditworthiness. Unused debt capacities depict the temporal access to external debt funds and measure a firm's financial flexibility. Firms with high unused debt capacities realize a larger fraction of their investment opportunity set, borrow more often, and issue higher volumes of debt. Firms that have exhausted their debt capacity issue equity or pay down debt when having a financial surplus. These patterns of actively using and restoring unused debt capacities imply that preserving financial flexibility is of first-order importance in corporate finance.

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  • Hess, Dieter & Immenkötter, Philipp, 2014. "How much is too much? Debt capacity and financial flexibility," CFR Working Papers 14-03, University of Cologne, Centre for Financial Research (CFR).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:cfrwps:1403
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    1. Michal Karas & Mária Režòáková, 2023. "A novel approach to estimating the debt capacity of European SMEs," Equilibrium. Quarterly Journal of Economics and Economic Policy, Institute of Economic Research, vol. 18(2), pages 551-581, June.
    2. Asit Bhattacharyya & Md Lutfur Rahman & Sue Wright, 2023. "Improving small and medium‐size enterprise performance: Does working capital management enhance the effectiveness of financial inclusion?," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 63(4), pages 3943-3969, December.
    3. Lambrinoudakis, Costas & Skiadopoulos, George & Gkionis, Konstantinos, 2019. "Capital structure and financial flexibility: Expectations of future shocks," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 1-18.
    4. Costas Lambrinoudakis & Michael Neumann & George Skiadopoulos, 2014. "Capital Structure and Financial Flexibility: Expectations of Future Shocks," Working Papers 731, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.
    5. Philip Kotze & Kunofiwa Tsaurai & Godfrey Marozva, 2024. "Financial Flexibility Prevalence Revisited with Evidence from South Africa," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 17(10), pages 1-14, October.

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