Geographical diversification and corporate liquidity in Malaysia: a quantile regression approach

Purpose - This paper aims to examine the effect of geographical diversification on corporate liquidity in Malaysian firms. Liquidity is represented by both cash and working capital. Design/methodology/approach - Data for this study is collected from a total of 735 firms over a period of five years, from 2010 to 2014, resulting in a total of 2,904 firm-year observations. The effect of geographical diversification on the cash and working capital of the firms is analyzed by using the ordinary least squares (OLS) with standard errors adjusted for firm level clustering and the quantile regression (QR) analyses. Control variables which represent the characteristics of the firms are also considered. Findings - Analysis using the OLS regression technique indicates that geographical diversification has a highly significant positive influence on corporate cash holdings, while the influence of working capital is negative and its significance is only at the 10 per cent level. However, when QR is used to analyze the relationships, it is found that geographical diversification is only significant in positively influencing cash holdings for firms with low cash holdings, but the relationship is insignificant at high levels of cash holdings. Additionally, working capital is significantly influenced by geographical diversification at high levels of working capital but not at low levels. Originality/value - To the author’s knowledge, this is the first study to analyze the influence of geographical diversification on liquidity by considering both cash and working capital. The effect of diversification on liquidity is mostly studied in developed countries, whereas this study is focused on a developing country. Additionally, this study uses QR to analyze relationships at different levels rather than at aggregate level as done in OLS regression analysis.