This paper addresses the following unresolved questions: Why do some firms issue equity instead of debt? Why did most firms retain their cash holdings instead of distributing them as dividends in recent times? How do firms change their financing policies during a period of severe financial...

We develop a dynamic investment options framework with optimal capital structure and analyze the effect of debt maturity. We find that in the absence of financing constraints short-term debt maximizes firm value. In contrast with most literature results, in the absence of constraints, higher...

We develop and empirically test a trade-off model for the analysis of leverage changes in mergers and acquisitions. This study extends prior findings of a post-merger increase in leverage for the acquiring firm by linking this leverage increase to merging firms that are less correlated, create...