The inverse relation between leverage and profitability is widely regarded as a serious defect of the tradeoff theory. We show that the defect is not with the theory but with the use of a leverage ratio in which profitability affects both the numerator and the denominator. Profitability directly...

Equity market liberalizations open up domestic stock markets to foreign investors. A puzzle in the literature is why developing countries exhibit relatively small financial impacts associated with liberalizations. We use cross-firm variation in corporate governance at the time of the official...

The pecking order theory of corporate leverage is tested against the static tradeoff theory of corporate leverage, using a broad cross-section of US firms over the period 1980-1998. A derivation of the conditional target adjustment framework is provided as a better empirical test of mean...

Do the legal rights of creditors influence whether firms borrow from arm's length or relationship lenders in a country? We examine this question by exploiting the staggered adoption of legal reforms that changed creditor rights. We find that as creditor rights strengthen, firms exhibit a greater...

Do the legal rights of creditors influence whether firms borrow from arm's length or relationship lenders in a country? In this paper, we examine this question by exploiting the staggered adoption of legal reforms that changed creditor rights. We show that as creditor rights strengthen, firms...

The empirical implications of the trade-off theory, the market timing theory, and Welch's (2003) theory of capital structure are examined using aggregate US data for 1952 to 2000. There is a long-run leverage ratio to which the system reverts. Deviations from that ratio help to predict debt...

We examine corporate investment spending around the asset price bubble in Japan in the late 1980s and make three contributions to our understanding of how stock valuations affect investment. First, investment responds significantly to nonfundamental components of stock valuations during asset...

Asymmetric information models suggest that a borrower's choice of debt maturity depends on its private information about its default probabilities, i.e., borrowers with favorable information prefer short-term debt while those with unfavorable information prefer long-term debt. We test this...

We study whether bestowing CEO and chairman duties on one individual affects a board's decision to dismiss an ineffective CEO. The results show that the sensitivity of CEO turnover to firm performance is significantly lower when the CEO and chairman responsibilities are vested in the same...

This paper examines investment spending of Japanese firms around the 'asset price bubble' in the late-1980s and makes three contributions to our understanding of how stock valuations affect investment. First, corporate investment responds significantly to nonfundamental components of stock...