Corporate Finance Capital structure by Yanzhi Wang 1
Slide 2
Very early papers Trade-off theory In perfect and efficient
markets, capital structure is irrelevant. (Modigliani and
Miller(1958)) The trade-off theory determines an optimal capital
structure by adding various imperfections. Including Taxes
:(modigliani and miller(1963) Miller and Scholes(1978) Defngelo and
masulis(1980)) Financial distress cost: Myers(1977) Agency costs:
Jensen(1986) Fama and Miller(1972) Harris and Raviv(1991)
Slide 3
Shyam-Sunder and Myers (1999) Summary: This paper tests
traditional capital structure models against the alternative of a
pecking order model of corporate financing. This paper checks the
statistical power of their tests against alternative hypotheses. We
find that a simple pecking order model explains much more of the
time-series variance in actual debt ratios than a target adjustment
model based on the static tradeoff theory. Moreover, we show that
the pecking order hypothesis can be rejected if actual financing
follows the target- adjustment specification. On the other hand,
this specification of the static tradeoff hypothesis will appear to
work when financing follows the pecking order. 3
Slide 4
Static tradeoff theory It assumes an optimal capital structure
of a firm. A value-maximizing firm would equate benefit and cost at
the margin, and operate at the top of the value curve. 4 The curve
would top out at relatively high debt ratios for safe, profitable
firms with plenty of taxes to shield and assets whose values would
escape serious damage in financial distress.
Slide 5
Static tradeoff theory- Empirical finding Schwartz and Aronson
(1967), have documented evidence of strong industry effects in debt
ratios, which they interpret as evidence of optimal ratios. Long
and Malitz (1985) show that leverage ratios are negatively related
to research and development expenditures, which they use as a proxy
for intangible assets. Taggart (1977), Marsh (1982), Auerbach
(1985), Jalilvand and Harris (1984) and Opler and Titman (1994)
find mean reversion in debt ratios or evidence that firms appear to
adjust toward debt targets. 5
Slide 6
Pecking order theory By Myers and Majluf (1984) In the pecking
order theory, there is no well-defined optimal debt ratio. The
attraction of interest tax shields and the threat of financial
distress are assumed second-order. Debt ratios change when there is
an imbalance of internal cash flow, net of dividends, and real
investment opportunities. Highly profitable firms with limited
investment opportunities work down to low debt ratios. Firms whose
investment opportunities exceed internally generated funds borrow
more and more. Changes in debt ratios are driven by the need for
external funds, not by any attempt to reach an optimal capital
structure. 6
Slide 7
Pecking order theory- Empirical finding Myers (1984) argues
that the negative valuation effects of equity issues or
leverage-reducing exchange offers do not support the tradeoff
story. That is, if changes in debt ratios are movements towards the
top of the curve (as in Fig. 1), both increases and decreases in
leverage should be value enhancing, and there should be NO negative
valuation effect. Kester (1986), Titman and Wessels (1988) and
Rajan and Zingales (1995) find strong negative relationships
between debt ratios and past profitability. (Remember! STT predicts
positive relationship in this profitability test) 7
Slide 8
Pecking order model Funds flow deficit is where The pecking
order hypothesis to be tested is: 8
Slide 9
Pecking order model If DEF is negative (by firm i). We expect
a=0 and b PO =1. The pecking order coefficient is b PO. This is the
simplest version of the pecking order (as expressed in above
equation) but cannot be generally correct. It may, however, be a
good description of financing over a wide range of moderate debt
ratios. 9
Slide 10
Static tradeoff model The simple form of the target adjustment
model states that changes in the debt ratio are explained by
deviations of the current ratio from the target. The regression
specification is: where D * it is the target debt level for firm i
at time t. We take b TA, the target-adjustment coefficient. The
target D * is generally unobservable. What should we do? 10
Slide 11
Data and sample selection Sample includes all firms on the
Industrial Compustat files. Financial firms and regulated utilities
were excluded. The sample period overs 1971-1989 because Compustat
includes flow of funds statements from 1971. The requirement for
continuous data on flow of funds restricts our sample to 157 firms.
11
Slide 12
Regression results for target adjustment and pecking order
models Coefficients of TA and BO are all consistent with the
predictions. R-sq of pecking order model is much higher 12
Slide 13
Test of power Statistical power is often investigated using
Monte Carlo simulation on hypothetical data. In this case we start
with the actual investment outlays and operating results of our
sample companies. We then generate hypothetical time series of debt
issues or retirements, one series for each of the 157 sample
companies, using either the target adjustment model, Eq. (3), or
the pecking order model, Eq. (2). 13
Slide 14
Test of power Actual data indicates what they found in previous
table 14
Slide 15
Test of power Pecking specification rejects pecking order
theory when using simulated target adjustment series.
Target-adjustment specification fits the simulated pecking order
series just as well as the actual data! This is clearly a false
positive. 15
Slide 16
Frank and Goyal (2003) Summary: This paper tests the pecking
order theory. Contrary to the pecking order theory, net equity
issues track the financing deficit more closely than do net debt
issues. Financing deficit is less important in explaining net debt
issues over time for firms of all sizes. 16
Slide 17
Tests on capital structure theories Rajan and Zingales (1995)
use a different information set and international data to account
for corporate leverage. Shyam-Sunder and Myers (1999) find strong
support for this prediction in a sample of 157 firms that had
traded continuously over the period 1971 to 1989. Yet, 157 firms is
a relatively small sample from the set of all publicly traded US
firms. Frank and Goyal (2003) study the extent to which the pecking
order theory of capital structure provides a satisfactory account
of the financing behavior of publicly traded US firms over the 1971
to 1998 period. 17
Slide 18
Three tasks First, the paper provides evidence about the broad
patterns of financing activity, which include checks on the
significance of external finance (bond and equity issues). Second,
the paper examines a number of implications of the pecking order in
the context of Shyam-Sunder and Myers (1999) regression tests.
Finally, the paper examines whether the pecking order theory
receives greater support among firms with severe adverse selection
problems. Small high-growth firms are often thought of as firms
with large information asymmetries. 18
Slide 19
Pecking order model We can use the flow of funds data to
provide a partially aggregated form of the accounting cash flow
identity as: Shyam-Sunder and Myers (1999) setting: Shyam-Sunder
and Myers (1999) include the current portion of long-term debt (R t
) as part of the financing deficit beyond its role in the change in
working capital. This paper reports only the results for which the
current portion of long-term debt is not included as a separate
component of the financing deficit. This choice favors the pecking
order, but it does not affect the conclusions. 19
Slide 20
Pecking order model Changes in cash are included in changes in
net working capital ( W). Changes in cash could be correlated with
the amount of debt issued. This could arise in the presence of debt
and equity issues, with excess proceeds parked for some period of
time in excess cash balances. Inclusion of cash favors the pecking
order theory. The pecking order theory treats the financing deficit
as exogenous. The financing deficit includes investment and
dividends, which are probably endogenously determined. 20
Slide 21
Disaggregation of the financing deficit Consider the following
specification: A unit increase in any of the components of DEF it
must have the same unit impact on D it, i.e., 21
Slide 22
Other information on leverage To test the pecking order, the
paper considers tangibility, M/B, sales and profitability as key
conventional variables. Firms with few tangible assets would have
greater asymmetric information problems. Thus, firms with few
tangible assets will tend to accumulate more debt over time and
become more highly levered. However, tangibility is negatively
related to the lower distress cost, in a way few tangible assets
lead to less debt. Firms with high market-to-book ratios are often
thought to have more future growth opportunities. Debt could limit
a firms ability to seize such opportunities when they appear.
22
Slide 23
Other information on leverage Large firms are usually more
diversified, have better reputations in debt markets, and face
lower information costs when borrowing. The predictions on
profitability are ambiguous. The tradeoff theory predicts that
profitable firms should be more highly levered to offset corporate
taxes. Yet profitable firms have more internet capital, so debt
should be lowered. What sign of coefficient is expected? 23
Slide 24
Deficit, issuance of debt and equity Which one correlates
deficit? 24
Slide 25
Pecking order test What does gap mean here? Does the table
result support POT? 25
Slide 26
Pecking order test Disaggregation of the financing deficit
26
Slide 27
Other information on leverage 27
Slide 28
Baker and Wurgler (2002) Firms usually issue equity when their
market values are high, relative to book and past market values,
and repurchase equity when their market values are low. This paper
documents that the resulting effects on capital structure are very
persistent. As a consequence, current capital structure is strongly
related to historical market values. The results suggest the theory
that capital structure is the cumulative outcome of past attempts
to time the equity market. 28
Slide 29
Introduction Pecking order theory Static version Myers and
Majluf(1984) predicts that managers will follow a pecking order,
using up internal funds first, then using up risky debt, and
finally resorting to equity. Dynamic version Myers(1984) suggests
that High growth firms reduce leverage in order to avoid raising
equity as investment opportunities arise in the future.
Slide 30
Introduction Managerial entrenchment theory Zwiebel(1996)
suggests that high valuations and good investment opportunities
facilitate equity finance, but at the same time allow managers to
become entrenched. They may refuse to raise debt to rebalance in
later periods.
Slide 31
Introduction Market timing phenomenon Equity market timing
refer to the practice of issuing shares at high prices and
repurchasing at low prices. Firm issue equity when the cost of
equity is relatively low and repurchase equity when the cost is
relatively high. Firms tend to issue equity at times when investors
are rather to enthusiastic about earnings prospects Managers admit
to market timing in anonymous surveys. (Graham and
harvey(2001)).
Slide 32
Variable definitions Book equity as total assets less total
liabilities and preferred stock plus deferred taxes and convertible
debt. Market equity is defined as common shares outstanding times
price. Market leverage as book debt divided by the result of total
assets minus book equity plus market equity. (e/A) as the change in
book equity minus the change in balance sheet retained earnings
divided by assets ( RE/A) as the change in retained earnings
divided by assets (d/A) as the residual change in assets divided by
assets.
Slide 33
Recent calendar trends in this sample include a decrease in
market leverage, an increase in equity issues, and a decrease in
internal finance. The concurrent increase in equity issues is
suggestive of market timing.
Slide 34
Market-to-book and market timing Using three other variables
that Rajan and Zingales(1995) find to be correlated to leverage in
several developed countries. Market-to-book is defined as assets
minus book equity plus market equity all divided by assets. Asset
tangibility is defined as net plant, property, and equipment
divided by total assets Profitability is defined as earnings before
interest, taxes, and depreciation divided by total assets. Size is
measured as the log of net sales.
Slide 35
Slide 36
External finance weighted average Market timing could be just a
local opportunism whose effect is quickly rebalance to some target
leverage ratio Market timing may have persistent effects, and
historical valuations will help to explain why leverage ratios
differ: external finance weighted-average The variable takes high
values for firms that raised external finance when the
market-to-book ratio was high and vice-versa.
Slide 37
Controlling for current investment opportunities in the form of
current market-to- book leaves the past within-firm variation to do
a better job of picking up. M/B efwa is the residual influence of
past, within- firm variation in market-to-book.
Slide 38
Slide 39
Slide 40
Slide 41
Alta (2006) This paper examines the capital structure
implications of market timing, and isolates timing attempts in the
initial public offering. This paper finds that compared with
cold-market IPOs, hot-market IPO firms issue substantially more
equity, and lower their leverage ratios. However, immediately after
going public, hot- market firms increase their leverage ratios by
issuing more debt and less equity relative to cold- market firms.
At the end of the second year following the IPO, the impact of
market timing on leverage completely vanishes. 41
Slide 42
Long-term impact of market timing on capital structure Baker
and Wurgler (2002) find persistent timing effects on leverage that
extend beyond 10 years. The market-to-book ratio is likely to proxy
for underlying firm characteristics (most notably the long-term
growth), a spurious relation between history and capital structure
may obtain. More growth opportunities lead to more needs which are
recorded in the history, market-to-book ratio is higher for high
growth stocks. This is less relevant to the market timing. 42
Slide 43
IPO and capital structure This paper focuses on a single
financing event, the initial public offering, in an attempt to
capture market timing and its impact on capital structure.
Investors face more uncertainty and a higher degree of asymmetric
information when valuing IPO firms than they face in the case of
mature public companies. Hence, IPOs offer more room for
misvaluation. Market timing attempt is most apparent in the IPO
market. IPO sample is likely to be highly revealing of pure market
timing motives that are distinct from long- range financing policy
requirements. 43
Slide 44
Main market timing measure My measure of market timing is
direct and very simple: whether the IPO takes place in a hot issue
market, characterized by high IPO volume in terms of the number of
issuers, or a cold issue market If issuers regard hot markets as
windows of opportunity with a temporarily low cost of equity
capital, they should react by issuing more equity than they would
otherwise do. Conversely, cold-market IPOs are likely to keep their
equity issues to a necessary minimum, as market conditions are less
favorable than average. Quantifying market timing attempts this way
has the advantage of not picking up firm-level characteristics; the
timing measure is instead a function of market conditions. 44
Slide 45
Data and sample selection The initial sample consists of all
IPOs between January 1, 1971, and December 31, 1999, reported by
the Securities Data Company (SDC). The sample excludes spinoffs,
unit offers, financial firms with SIC codes between 6000 and 6999,
and firms with book values of assets below $10 million in 1999
dollars at the end of the IPO year. This paper further restricts
the sample to those firms for which COMPUSTAT data are available
for the last fiscal year before the IPO. 45
Slide 46
Variable definitions Book debt, D, is defined as total
liabilities (COMPUSTAT Annual Item 181) and preferred stock (Item
10) minus deferred taxes (Item 35) and convertible debt (Item 79).
Book equity, E, is total assets (Item 6) minus book debt. Book
leverage, D/A, is then defined as book debt divided by total
assets. Market-to-book ratio, M/B, is book debt plus market equity
(common shares outstanding (Item 25) times share price (Item 199))
divided by total assets. As in Baker and Wurgler (2002), I drop
observations for which M/B exceeds 10.0. Net debt issues, d/A, is
the change in book debt. Net equity issues, e/A, is the change in
book equity minus the change in retained earnings (Item 36). Newly
retained earnings, RE/A, is the change in retained earnings.
Profitability is measured by EBITDA/A, which is earnings before
interest, taxes, and depreciation (Item 13). SIZE is the logarithm
of net sales (Item 12) in millions of 1999 dollars. 46
Slide 47
Hot and Cold Markets Hot (cold) months are then defined as
those that are above (below) the median in the distribution of the
detrended monthly moving average IPO volume across all the months
in the sample. 47
Slide 48
Market timing effects on issuance activity 48
Slide 49
Alternative explanations Hot-market firms could issue more
equity than their cold-market counterparts for reasons other than
market timing. Hot-market firms may be severely overleveraged
before going public, and may attempt to revert back to their
leverage targets at the IPO. Another potential explanation for the
equity issue activity of hot-market firms is that they grow faster.
If hot-market firms invest at higher rates, or expect to do so in
the near future, then they are likely to finance part of this
growth by raising equity capital. 49
Slide 50
Test on alternative explanations 50
Slide 51
Dividend payout of IPOs Further evidence of market timing comes
from the dividends hot-market firms pay in the IPO year. Issuers
view hot markets as windows of opportunity for selling equity
relatively easily, and hence feel confident to proceed with an
offering whose proceeds will largely finance a special dividend.
51
Slide 52
Short-term and long-term impacts of market timing on capital
structure 52
Slide 53
Welch (2004) U.S. corporations do not issue and repurchase debt
and equity to counteract the mechanistic effects of stock returns
on their debt equity ratios. Stock returns can explain about 40
percent of debt ratio dynamics. Although corporate net issuing
activity is lively and although it can explain 60 percent of debt
ratio dynamics (long term debt issuing activity being most capital
structurerelevant), corporate issuing motives remain largely a
mystery. 53
Slide 54
Capital structure ratios Actual corporate debt ratio (ADR) is
defined as the book value of debt (D) divided by the book value of
debt plus the market value of equity (E), and we set basic
specification estimate as The term IDR is the implied debt ratio
that comes about if the corporation issues (net) neither debt nor
equity, where x is the stock return net of dividends. The amount of
debt changes with new debt issues, debt retirements, coupon
payments, and debt value changes. 54
Slide 55
Hypothesis Perfect readjustment hypothesis: 1 =1, 2 =0. Perfect
nonreadjustment hypothesis: 1 =0, 2 =1. Corporate debt evolves as
where is the total debt net issuing activity. Equivalently, the
amount of corporate equity changes with stock returns (net of
dividends) and new equity issues net of equity repurchases. 55
Slide 56
Hypothesis Corporate equity evolves as where ENI is net equity
issuing and stock repurchasing activity. With these definitions,
debt ratios evolve as 56
Slide 57
Hypothesis Mathematically, if the corporation issues debt and
equity so that then ADR remains perfectly constant across periods
(ADR t+k =ADR t => 1 =1, 2 =0). In contrast, if the corporation
issues debt and equity so that then IDR perfectly predicts debt
ratios (IDR t,t+k =ADR t => 1 =0, 2 =1) 57
Slide 58
A dependent sort Welch sorts all firms by stock return
controlled for size of firms as follows. All firms are first sorted
by year and then by sales and, within each consecutive set of 10
(similarly sized) firms, allocated into 10 bins on the basis of
their S&P net stock return performance. This procedure keeps a
roughly equal number of firms in each decile and maximizes the
spread in stock returns across decile, holding calendar year and
firm size constant. Questions: what difference between dependent
and independent sorts would be ? 58
Slide 59
Corporate Activity, Equity Growth, and Capital Structure,
Classified by Stock Returns 59
Slide 60
Over one year, firms respond to poor performance with more debt
issuing activity and to good performance with more equity issuing
activity. This hints that firms do not immediately readjust: firms
whose debt ratios increase (decrease) because of poor (good) stock
return performance seem to use their issuing activities not to
readjust but to amplify the stock return changes (same as Baker and
Wurgler, 2002) The fourth row shows that the relationship between
stock returns and activist equity expansion is more U shaped when
dividends are considered. 60
Slide 61
Fama-MacBeth (1973) regression The reported coefficients (in %)
and standard errors are computed from the time series of cross
sectional regression coefficients (called Fama MacBeth) 61
Slide 62
Regression using change in ADR 62
Slide 63
Regression using change in ADR The regression can also be
estimated in changes or with a restriction that the coefficients on
IDR and ADR add up to one: After rearrangement, the estimated
regressions are Thus stock returncaused equity growth can explain
about 40 percent of capital structure dynamics All corporate
issuing activity together can explain about 6070 percent. 63
Slide 64
Frank and Goyal (2009) This paper examines the relative
importance of many factors in the capital structure decisions of
publicly traded American firms from 1950 to 2003. The most reliable
factors for explaining market leverage are: Median industry
leverage (+ effect on leverage), Market-to-book assets ratio ( ),
Tangibility (+), Profits ( ), Log of assets (+), Expected inflation
(+). When considering book leverage, somewhat similar effects are
found but some become weaker. The empirical evidence seems
reasonably consistent with some versions of the trade-off theory of
capital structure. 64
Slide 65
Capital structure theories Many theories of capital structure
have been proposed. But only a few seem to have many advocates.
Notably, most corporate finance textbooks point to the trade-off
theory in which taxation and deadweight bankruptcy costs are key.
Myers (1984) proposed the pecking order theory in which there is a
financing hierarchy of retained earnings, debt, and then equity.
The idea that firms engage in market timing has become popular.
Finally, agency theory lurks in the background of much theoretical
discussion. Agency concerns are often lumped into the trade-off
framework broadly interpreted. 65
Slide 66
Measures of leverage Book leverage Book leverage is also
preferred because financial markets fluctuate a great deal and
managers are said to believe that market leverage numbers are
unreliable as a guide to corporate financial policy. Market
leverage Book value of equity is primarily a plug number used to
balance the left-hand side and the right-hand side of the balance
sheet rather than a managerially relevant number. Book value of
equity can even be negative. The book measure is backward looking
and markets are generally assumed to be forward looking. 66
Slide 67
Predictions of leverage factors Profitability Firm size Growth
opportunity - Industry conditions Tangibility Tax Risk -
Supply-side factors Stock and debt market conditions Macroeconomic
Conditions How can we measure those variables? What are
predictions? See pages 7-11 for a thorough discussion. 67
Slide 68
What is the firm-year for 1950-2003? What are average level of
leverage? What differs among leverage measures? How do they deal
with outliers? 68
Slide 69
Regression results 69
Slide 70
70
Slide 71
71
Slide 72
Lemmon, Roberts and Zender (2008) We find that the majority of
variation in leverage ratios is driven by an unobserved
time-invariant effect that generates surprisingly stable capital
structures: High (low) levered firms tend to remain as such for
over two decades. This feature of leverage is largely unexplained
by previously identified determinants, is robust to firm exit, and
is present prior to the IPO, suggesting that variation in capital
structures is primarily determined by factors that remain stable
for long periods of time. 72
Slide 73
How do we know the capital structure of a firm? Finance studies
identify a number of factors that purport to explain variation in
corporate capital structures. However, after decades of research,
how much do we really know? The adjusted R-squares from traditional
leverage regressions using previously identified determinants range
from 18% to 29%. In contrast, the adjusted R-square from a
regression of leverage on firm fixed effects is 60%, implying that
the majority of variation in leverage in a panel of firms is time
invariant and is largely unexplained by previously identified
determinants. One possible explanation for these findings is that
commonly employed empirical models are misspecified because
managers are more concerned with variation in long-run or
equilibrium levels of leverage determinants, as opposed to
short-run fluctuations. 73
Slide 74
74
Slide 75
Regression anlalysis 75
Slide 76
Cohn, Mills and Towery (2014) This study uses corporate tax
return data to examine the evolution of firms' financial structure
and performance after leveraged buyouts (LBOs) for a comprehensive
sample of 317 LBOs taking place between 1995 and 2007. It is found
that little evidence of operating improvements subsequent to an
LBO, although consistent with prior studies, we do observe
operating improvements in the set of LBO firms that have public
financial statements. They also find that firms do not reduce
leverage after LBOs, even if they generate excess cash flow.
76
Slide 77
Leveraged buyout A leveraged buyout (LBO) is when a company is
purchased with a combination of equity and significant amounts of
borrowed money, structured in such a way that the target's cash
flows or assets are used as the collateral (or "leverage") to
secure and repay the money borrowed to purchase the
target-company/asset. Private equity acquirers took almost 3% of
the U.S. stock market (by market capitalization) private in LBOs in
2006. LBO is closely related to issues regarding M&A and
corporate control. 77
Slide 78
Leveraged buyout Most LBOs go private and have no public
financial data. This paper overcomes the lack of public financial
data by instead relying on confidential federal corporate tax
return data. Because all U.S. corporations must file tax returns.
Their primary sample consists of 317 previously publicly traded
firms acquired in LBOs between 1995 and 2007 with assets of at
least $10 million. This represents approximately 90% of LBO firms
of this size during this period. 78
Slide 79
LBO sample 79 This paper collects LBOs between 1995 and 2007 of
publicly traded, stand-alone firms using Dealogic's Mergers &
Acquisitions database and Thomson Financial's Securities Data
Corporation (SDC) Platinum mergers data- base.
Slide 80
Operating performance Levels of ROS Results are similar with
ROA, 80
Slide 81
Changes in operating performance We do observe statistically
significant positive median changes in industry- and performance
level-adjusted (though not propensity- adjusted) PreInterestROS
over most time horizons, but the magnitudes of these increases are
relatively small (less than 2% inallcases). 81
Slide 82
Results with public data Operating improves in the set of LBO
firms that have public financial statements. 82
Slide 83
Capital structure of LBOs Firms do not reduce leverage after
LBOs, even if they generate excess cash flow. 83