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Do Financing Constraints Explain Why Investment is Correlated with Cash Flow?

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Author Info
Steven N. Kaplan
Luigi Zingales

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Abstract

This paper investigates the sources of the correlation between corporate cash flow and investment by undertaking an in-depth analysis of the 49 low-dividend firms identified by Fazzari, Hubbard, and Petersen (1988) as having an unusually high investment-cash flow sensitivity. We find that in only 15% of firm-years is there some question as to a firm's ability to access internal or external funds to increase investment. Strikingly, those firms that appear less financially constrained exhibit a significantly greater investment- cash flow sensitivity than firms that appear more financially constrained. We find this pattern for the entire sample period, for sub-periods, and for individual years. The results indicate that a higher sensitivity cannot be interpreted as evidence that a firm is more financially constrained. We discuss reasons and provide evidence why the opposite may be true. These findings challenge much of the existing evidence on the effects of financial constraints.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 5267.

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Date of creation: Sep 1995
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:5267

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
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  6. Toni M. Whited, 1990. "Debt, liquidity constraints, and corporate investment: evidence from panel data," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 114, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Heitor Almeida & Murillo Campello, 2006. "Financial Constraints, Asset Tangibility, and Corporate Investment," NBER Working Papers 12087, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Joao F. Gomes & Amir Yaron & Lu Zhang, 2003. "Asset Prices and Business Cycles with Costly External Finance," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 6(4), pages 767-788, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  3. Cristiano Machado Costa & Lourenço Senne Paz, 2004. "Are Brazilian Firms Savings Sensitive To Cash Windfalls?," Anais do XXXII Encontro Nacional de Economia [Proceedings of the 32th Brazilian Economics Meeting] 063, ANPEC - Associação Nacional dos Centros de Pósgraduação em Economia [Brazilian Association of Graduate Programs in Economics]. [Downloadable!]
  4. Owen Lamont, 1996. "Cash Flow and Investment: Evidence from Internal Capital Markets," NBER Working Papers 5499, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Heitor Almeida & Murillo Campello & Michael S. Weisbach, 2002. "Corporate Demand for Liquidity," NBER Working Papers 9253, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Vivek Ghosal & Prakash Loungani, 1996. "Firm size and the impact of profit-margin uncertainty on investment: do financing constraints play a role?," International Finance Discussion Papers 557, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.). [Downloadable!]
  7. Larry Lang & Eli Ofek & Rene M. Stulz, 1995. "Leverage, Investment, and Firm Growth," NBER Working Papers 5165, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  8. Christopher Polk & Paola Sapienza, 2004. "The Real Effects of Investor Sentiment," NBER Working Papers 10563, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  9. Natalia Isachenkova & Tomasz Mickiewicz, 2004. "Ownership Characteristics and Access to Finance: Evidence from a Survey of Large Privatised Companies in Hungary and Poland," William Davidson Institute Working Papers Series 2004-666, William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan Stephen M. Ross Business School. [Downloadable!]
  10. Nittai K. Bergman & Dirk Jenter, 2005. "Employee Sentiment and Stock Option Compensation," NBER Working Papers 11409, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  11. Yoshiro Miwa & J. Mark Ramseyer, 2001. "The Fable of the Keiretsu," CIRJE F-Series CIRJE-F-109, CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  12. Tomasz Mickiewicz & Kate Bishop & Urmas Varblane, 2004. "Financial Constraints in Investment - Foreign Versus Domestic Firms. Panel Data Results From Estonia, 1995-1999," William Davidson Institute Working Papers Series 2004-648, William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan Stephen M. Ross Business School. [Downloadable!]
  13. Sophie Manigart & Katleen Baeyens & Ilse Verschueren, 2002. "Financing and investment interdependencies in unquoted belgian compagnies: the role of venture capital," Research series 200205-10, National Bank of Belgium. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  14. Raphael Bergoeing & Andrés Hernando & Andrea Repetto, 2006. "Market Reforms and Efficiency Gains in Chile," Working Papers Central Bank of Chile 372, Central Bank of Chile. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  15. Owen Lamont & Christopher Polk & Jesus Saa-Requejo, 1997. "Financial Constraints and Stock Returns," NBER Working Papers 6210, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  16. Hyun-Han Shin & Rene M. Stulz, 1996. "An Analysis of Divisional Investment Policies," NBER Working Papers 5639, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  17. Stephen D. Oliner & Glenn D. Rudebusch, 1996. "Is there a broad credit channel for monetary policy?," Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, pages 3-13. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  18. Steven N. Kaplan & Luigi Zingales, 2000. "Investment-Cash Flow Sensitivities are not Valid Measures of Financing Constraints," NBER Working Papers 7659, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  19. Goergen, M. & Renneboog, L.D.R., 2000. "Investment policy, internal financing and ownership concentration in the UK," Discussion Paper 116, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  20. Simon Gilchrist & Charles Himmelberg, 1998. "Investment, Fundamentals and Finance," NBER Working Papers 6652, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  21. Marco Gallegati, 2005. "Financial constraints and the balance sheet channel: a re-interpretation," Applied Economics, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 37(16), pages 1925-1933, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
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