Principles of Corporate Finance - 4/E

Prior research on capital structure by Rajan and Zingales (1995) suggests that the level of gearing in UK companies is positively related to size and tangibility, and negatively correlated with profitability and the level of growth opportunities. However, as argued by Harris and Raviv (1991), ‘The interpretation of results must be tempered by an awareness of the difficulties involved in measuring both leverage and the explanatory variables of interest’. In this study the focus is on the difficulties of measuring gearing, and the sensitivity of Rajan and Zingales' results to variations in gearing measures are tested. Based on an analysis of the capital structure of 822 UK companies, Rajan and Zingales' results are found to be highly definitional-dependent. The determinants of gearing appear to vary significantly, depending upon which component of debt is being analysed. In particular, significant differences are found in the determinants of long- and short-term forms of debt. Given that trade credit and eq...

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Capital structure and its determinants in the UK - a decompositional analysis

This article analyses the determinants of the capital structure of 1054 UK companies from 1991 to 1997, and the extent to which the influence of these determinants are affected by time-invariant firm-specific heterogeneity. Comparing the results of pooled OLS and fixed effects panel estimation, significant differences in the results are found. While the OLS results are generally consistent with prior literature, the results of our fixed effects panel estimation contradict many of the traditional theories of the determinants of corporate financial structure. This suggests that results of traditional studies may be biased owing to a failure to control for firm-specific, time-invariant heterogeneity. The results of the fixed effects panel estimation find larger companies to have higher levels of both long-term and short-term debt than do smaller firms, profitability to be negatively correlated with the level of gearing, although profitable firms tend to have more short-term bank borrowing than less profitabl...

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Testing for inconsistencies in the estimation of UK capital structure determinants

We distinguish between horizontal and vertical joint ventures, and find correspondingly different valuation effects. Horizontal joint ventures create synergistic gains that are shared by the partners. In contrast, vertical joint ventures generate gains only for suppliers. This is similar to the patter we find for simple contracts, which suggests economic similiarities between vertical joint ventures and contracts. Analysing firms' choices between these contracting options, we find that firms choose vertical joint ventures over simple contracts when potential hold-up problems are severe and when suppliers face finance constraints. The results d not support a risk-sharing motive for joint ventures.

A Rexamination of the Motives and Gains in Joint Ventures

The Investment Opportunity Set and Corporate Financing, Dividend, and Compensation Policies: Empirical Evidence for Large Electric Holding Companies

Although the impact of growth opportunities on company value has been recognized since Miller and Modigliani (1961), relatively little empirical work has been undertaken to value growth opportunities. In this study the validity of the KBM model (Kester (1984) and Brealey and Myers (1981)) is tested on a sample of 278 large UK companies for 1987–1995. Applying standard assumptions, the value of growth opportunities is found to account for a larger proportion of market values than assets-in-place. However, tests of the KBM model cast doubt on the credibility of these results and the validity of the model. The KBM model is highly sensitive to the inclusion of inflation in the risk free interest rate, and with a real interest rate (which on theoretical grounds is preferable), the model ceases to provide credible results. The model also fails to provide results consistent with expectations derived from option pricing theory regarding the relationship between the value of growth opportunities and the value of a...

/pdf/measuring-growth-opportunities-4ft7xji0b8.pdf

Measuring Growth Opportunities

This paper examines the stock market reaction to 402 company investment announcements made by UK companies during the 1991–1996 period. The market-adjusted abnormal returns are generally positive but small. Investment announcements are classified according to functional categories, and we find the level of abnormal returns to vary according to the type of capital investment being announced. In particular, we find the market to react more favourably to investments that ‘create’ future investment opportunities, than to investments which can be categorized as ‘exercising’ investment opportunities. The market reaction also varies with firm size, with large companies tending to experience smaller responses to announcements than do smaller firms. Chung et al. (1998) reported that the quality of a company's investment opportunities is the primary determinant of market reactions to capital expenditure decisions. The findings presented here lend some support to a role for investment opportunities in market valuati...

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Company investment announcements and the market value of the firm

While numerous empirical studies include proxies for growth opportunities in their analyses, there is limited evidence as to the validity of the various growth proxies used. Based on a sample of 1942 firm-years for listed UK companies over the 1990–2004 period, we assess the performance of eight growth opportunities measures. Our results show that while all the growth measures show some ability to predict growth in company sales, total assets, or equity, there are substantial differences between the various models. In particular, Tobin's Q performs poorly while dividend-based measures generally perform best. However, none of the measures has any success in predicting earnings per share growth, even when controlling for mean reversion and other time-series patterns in earnings. We term this the ‘growth companies puzzle’. Growth companies do grow, but they do not grow in the key dimension (earnings) theory predicts. Whether the failure of ‘growth companies’ to deliver superior earnings growth is attributabl...

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The growth companies puzzle: can growth opportunities measures predict firm growth?

Traditional methods of estimating required rates of return overstate hurdle rates in the presence of growth opportunities. We attempt to quantify this effect by developing a simple model which: (i) identifies those companies that have valuable growth opportunities; (ii) splits the value of shares into ‘assets-in-place’ and ‘growth opportunities’; and (iii) splits the equity β into β for ‘assets-in-place’ and ‘growth opportunities’. We find growth opportunities for UK companies over the 1990-2004 period to average 33% of equity value. Incorporating the effect of growth opportunities, the average cost of capital for investment purposes falls by 1.1 percentage points.

/pdf/required-rates-of-return-for-corporate-investment-appraisal-2zapce1kng.pdf

Required rates of return for corporate investment appraisal in the presence of growth opportunities

Although the impact of growth opportunities on company value has been recognised since Miller and Modigliani (1961), relatively little empirical work has been undertaken to value growth opportunities In this paper we test the validity of the KBM model (Kester (1984) and Brealey and Myers (1981)) on a sample of 278 large UK companies for 1987-1995 Applying standard assumptions, we find the value of growth opportunities to account for a larger proportion of market values than assets-in-place However, tests of the KBM model cast doubt on the credibility of these results and the validity of the model The KBM model is highly sensitive to the inclusion of inflation in the risk free interest rate, and with a real interest rate (which on theoretical grounds is preferable), the model ceases to provide credible results The model also fails to provide results consistent with expectations derived from option pricing theory regarding the relationship between the value of growth opportunities and the value of assets-in-place These limitations of the KBM model indicate a need for a reappraisal of the method of measuring the value of growth opportunities

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Ian Rodney Carr Hirst

Papers

Measuring Growth Opportunities

Company investment announcements and the market value of the firm

The growth companies puzzle: can growth opportunities measures predict firm growth?

Required rates of return for corporate investment appraisal in the presence of growth opportunities

Measuring Growth Opportunities