Determinants of Capital Structure: Empirical Evidence from US Firm Panel Data
Capital structure is the resources which firms applied to invest new projects or assets as well as normal operations and firms’ capital structure is mainly composed by debt and equity. However, the factors which incentive firms to adjust their financing behaviors are ambiguous after plenty of theore...
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| Format: | Dissertation (University of Nottingham only) |
| Language: | English |
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2017
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| Online Access: | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/45712/ |
| _version_ | 1848797179455471616 |
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| author | CHEN, YUTING |
| author_facet | CHEN, YUTING |
| author_sort | CHEN, YUTING |
| building | Nottingham Research Data Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | Capital structure is the resources which firms applied to invest new projects or assets as well as normal operations and firms’ capital structure is mainly composed by debt and equity. However, the factors which incentive firms to adjust their financing behaviors are ambiguous after plenty of theoretical explanations and empirical studies over several decades. And the two debatable representative theories are the tradeoff theory and the pecking order theory. This paper mainly intends to investigate the determinants of the US firms’ capital structure through testing the panel data of common stock listed firms from 2006 to 2015. And then this paper also aims to compare the determinants of unregulated and regulated firms’ capital structures. Furthermore, according to previous empirical researches, the variables of firm characteristics employed for this paper are profitability, tangibility, firm size, growth opportunity, non-debt tax shields and volatility. Moreover, three different leverage measures are employed in this paper as the dependent variables.
According to the result, the coefficients of tangibility, growth opportunity and non-debt tax shields show the most significance level than other variables and the independent variables are more significant and powerful when the dependent variables are short-term debt ratio and total debt ratio. And the firms’ profitability is negatively correlated to short-term and total debt ratios; there exists inverse relation between tangibility and shorter-term and total debt ratios; large firms would prefer issue more debts; firms with more growth opportunities would increase their short-term and total debt ratios; there exists positive relation between firms’ non-debts tax shields and leverage levels and the firms’ volatility is inversely correlated firms’ long-term debt ratio. And there are some differences of determinants of capital structures between unregulated and regulated firms. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:59:46Z |
| format | Dissertation (University of Nottingham only) |
| id | nottingham-45712 |
| institution | University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus |
| institution_category | Local University |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:59:46Z |
| publishDate | 2017 |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | nottingham-457122018-04-24T14:39:49Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/45712/ Determinants of Capital Structure: Empirical Evidence from US Firm Panel Data CHEN, YUTING Capital structure is the resources which firms applied to invest new projects or assets as well as normal operations and firms’ capital structure is mainly composed by debt and equity. However, the factors which incentive firms to adjust their financing behaviors are ambiguous after plenty of theoretical explanations and empirical studies over several decades. And the two debatable representative theories are the tradeoff theory and the pecking order theory. This paper mainly intends to investigate the determinants of the US firms’ capital structure through testing the panel data of common stock listed firms from 2006 to 2015. And then this paper also aims to compare the determinants of unregulated and regulated firms’ capital structures. Furthermore, according to previous empirical researches, the variables of firm characteristics employed for this paper are profitability, tangibility, firm size, growth opportunity, non-debt tax shields and volatility. Moreover, three different leverage measures are employed in this paper as the dependent variables. According to the result, the coefficients of tangibility, growth opportunity and non-debt tax shields show the most significance level than other variables and the independent variables are more significant and powerful when the dependent variables are short-term debt ratio and total debt ratio. And the firms’ profitability is negatively correlated to short-term and total debt ratios; there exists inverse relation between tangibility and shorter-term and total debt ratios; large firms would prefer issue more debts; firms with more growth opportunities would increase their short-term and total debt ratios; there exists positive relation between firms’ non-debts tax shields and leverage levels and the firms’ volatility is inversely correlated firms’ long-term debt ratio. And there are some differences of determinants of capital structures between unregulated and regulated firms. 2017-09-11 Dissertation (University of Nottingham only) NonPeerReviewed application/pdf en https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/45712/1/Yuting%20CHEN%204266368%20Finance%20and%20Investment.pdf CHEN, YUTING (2017) Determinants of Capital Structure: Empirical Evidence from US Firm Panel Data. [Dissertation (University of Nottingham only)] capital structure; debt ratios; leverage levels; regulated firms |
| spellingShingle | capital structure; debt ratios; leverage levels; regulated firms CHEN, YUTING Determinants of Capital Structure: Empirical Evidence from US Firm Panel Data |
| title | Determinants of Capital Structure: Empirical Evidence from US Firm Panel Data |
| title_full | Determinants of Capital Structure: Empirical Evidence from US Firm Panel Data |
| title_fullStr | Determinants of Capital Structure: Empirical Evidence from US Firm Panel Data |
| title_full_unstemmed | Determinants of Capital Structure: Empirical Evidence from US Firm Panel Data |
| title_short | Determinants of Capital Structure: Empirical Evidence from US Firm Panel Data |
| title_sort | determinants of capital structure: empirical evidence from us firm panel data |
| topic | capital structure; debt ratios; leverage levels; regulated firms |
| url | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/45712/ |