Short-term financing sources in Africa: Substitutes or complements?

Using panel vector autocorrelation models (Panel VaR), we examine the dynamic interrelationships between short-term financing sources for a large sample of 8,464 firm-year observations from seven understudied developing economies over the period 1991-2015. On average, we find that short-term debt an...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Machokoto, Michael, Mahonye, Nyasha, Makate, Marshall
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier 2021
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/92264
Description
Summary:Using panel vector autocorrelation models (Panel VaR), we examine the dynamic interrelationships between short-term financing sources for a large sample of 8,464 firm-year observations from seven understudied developing economies over the period 1991-2015. On average, we find that short-term debt and trade credit are complements, while cash holdings are substitutes for short-term debt and trade credit. However, our further analyses show that the interrelationships between short-term financing sources are strong and significant before the financial crisis but diminish thereafter with contractions in credit supply. These changes highlight the impact of credit supply shocks on short-term financing policies of firms domiciled in less-developed capital markets. As firms in Africa, an exemplary less-developed capital market context, rely heavily on short-term financing sources, the dynamic interrelationships we document have important implications that are of interest to academics, practitioners, and policymakers alike.