IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jfinan/v69y2014i2p719-762.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Theory of Debt Maturity: The Long and Short of Debt Overhang

Author

Listed:
  • DOUGLAS W. DIAMOND
  • ZHIGUO HE

Abstract

type="main"> Debt maturity influences debt overhang, the reduced incentive for highly levered borrowers to make real investments because some value accrues to debt. Reducing maturity can increase or decrease overhang even when shorter term debt's value depends less on firm value. Future overhang is more volatile for shorter term debt, making future investment incentives volatile and influencing immediate investment incentives. With immediate investment, shorter term debt typically imposes lower overhang; longer term debt can impose less if asset volatility is higher in bad times. For future investments, reduced correlation between assets-in-place and investment opportunities increases the shorter term debt overhang.

Suggested Citation

  • Douglas W. Diamond & Zhiguo He, 2014. "A Theory of Debt Maturity: The Long and Short of Debt Overhang," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 69(2), pages 719-762, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jfinan:v:69:y:2014:i:2:p:719-762
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/jofi.12118
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Stohs, Mark Hoven & Mauer, David C, 1996. "The Determinants of Corporate Debt Maturity Structure," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 69(3), pages 279-312, July.
    2. Guedes, Jose & Opler, Tim, 1996. "The Determinants of the Maturity of Corporate Debt Issues," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(5), pages 1809-1833, December.
    3. Diamond, Douglas W., 1993. "Seniority and maturity of debt contracts," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 341-368, June.
    4. Zhiguo He & Wei Xiong, 2012. "Dynamic Debt Runs," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 25(6), pages 1799-1843.
    5. Zhiguo He & Wei Xiong, 2012. "Rollover Risk and Credit Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(2), pages 391-430, April.
    6. Shane A. Johnson, 2003. "Debt Maturity and the Effects of Growth Opportunities and Liquidity Risk on Leverage," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 16(1), pages 209-236.
    7. Sheridan Titman & Sergey Tsyplakov, 2007. "A Dynamic Model of Optimal Capital Structure," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 11(3), pages 401-451.
    8. Leland, Hayne E & Toft, Klaus Bjerre, 1996. "Optimal Capital Structure, Endogenous Bankruptcy, and the Term Structure of Credit Spreads," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(3), pages 987-1019, July.
    9. Markus K. Brunnermeier & Motohiro Yogo, 2009. "A Note on Liquidity Risk Management," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(2), pages 578-583, May.
    10. Leland, Hayne E, 1994. "Corporate Debt Value, Bond Covenants, and Optimal Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(4), pages 1213-1252, September.
    11. Merton, Robert C, 1974. "On the Pricing of Corporate Debt: The Risk Structure of Interest Rates," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 29(2), pages 449-470, May.
    12. Douglas W. Diamond, 1991. "Debt Maturity Structure and Liquidity Risk," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 106(3), pages 709-737.
    13. Eugene F. Fama, 2002. "Testing Trade-Off and Pecking Order Predictions About Dividends and Debt," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 15(1), pages 1-33, March.
    14. Jensen, Michael C. & Meckling, William H., 1976. "Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(4), pages 305-360, October.
    15. Moyen, Nathalie, 2007. "How big is the debt overhang problem?," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 433-472, February.
    16. Flannery, Mark J, 1986. "Asymmetric Information and Risky Debt Maturity Choice," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 41(1), pages 19-37, March.
    17. Douglas W. Diamond & Philip H. Dybvig, 2000. "Bank runs, deposit insurance, and liquidity," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, vol. 24(Win), pages 14-23.
    18. Black, Fischer & Scholes, Myron S, 1973. "The Pricing of Options and Corporate Liabilities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(3), pages 637-654, May-June.
    19. Gertner, Robert & Scharfstein, David, 1991. "A Theory of Workouts and the Effects of Reorganization Law," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(4), pages 1189-1222, September.
    20. Douglas W. Diamond & Raghuram G. Rajan, 2001. "Liquidity Risk, Liquidity Creation, and Financial Fragility: A Theory of Banking," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 109(2), pages 287-327, April.
    21. Hayne E. Leland., 1998. "Agency Costs, Risk Management, and Capital Structure," Research Program in Finance Working Papers RPF-278, University of California at Berkeley.
    22. Calomiris, Charles W & Kahn, Charles M, 1991. "The Role of Demandable Debt in Structuring Optimal Banking Arrangements," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(3), pages 497-513, June.
    23. He, Zhiguo, 2011. "A model of dynamic compensation and capital structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(2), pages 351-366, May.
    24. Hayne E. Leland, 1998. "Agency Costs, Risk Management, and Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(4), pages 1213-1243, August.
    25. Lambrecht, Bart M. & Myers, Stewart C., 2008. "Debt and managerial rents in a real-options model of the firm," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(2), pages 209-231, August.
    26. Matthew T. Billett & Tao‐Hsien Dolly King & David C. Mauer, 2007. "Growth Opportunities and the Choice of Leverage, Debt Maturity, and Covenants," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(2), pages 697-730, April.
    27. Barclay, Michael J & Smith, Clifford W, Jr, 1995. "The Maturity Structure of Corporate Debt," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(2), pages 609-631, June.
    28. Bodie, Zvi & Taggart, Robert A, Jr, 1978. "Future Investment Opportunities and the Value of the Call Provision on a Bond," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 33(4), pages 1187-1200, September.
    29. Myers, Stewart C., 1977. "Determinants of corporate borrowing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(2), pages 147-175, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Zhiguo He & Wei Xiong, 2012. "Rollover Risk and Credit Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(2), pages 391-430, April.
    2. Jeon, Haejun & Nishihara, Michi, 2015. "The effects of business cycle and debt maturity on a firm's investment and default decisions," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 326-351.
    3. Nils Friewald & Florian Nagler & Christian Wagner, 2022. "Debt Refinancing and Equity Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 77(4), pages 2287-2329, August.
    4. Ivan E. Brick & Rose C. Liao, 2017. "The joint determinants of cash holdings and debt maturity: the case for financial constraints," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 48(3), pages 597-641, April.
    5. Dung T. T. Tran & Hieu V. Phan, 2022. "Government economic policy uncertainty and corporate debt contracting," International Review of Finance, International Review of Finance Ltd., vol. 22(1), pages 169-199, March.
    6. Chen, Hui & Xu, Yu & Yang, Jun, 2021. "Systematic risk, debt maturity, and the term structure of credit spreads," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(3), pages 770-799.
    7. Dang, Viet A. & Phan, Hieu V., 2016. "CEO inside debt and corporate debt maturity structure," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 38-54.
    8. Kwanglim Seo, 2016. "The effect of franchising on debt maturity in the US restaurant industry," Tourism Economics, , vol. 22(6), pages 1404-1422, December.
    9. Della Seta, Marco & Morellec, Erwan & Zucchi, Francesca, 2020. "Short-term debt and incentives for risk-taking," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 137(1), pages 179-203.
    10. Zhiguo He & Konstantin Milbradt, 2016. "Dynamic Debt Maturity," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(10), pages 2677-2736.
    11. Wang, Qin (Emma) & Zhang, Jun, 2023. "Local institutional investors and debt maturity," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    12. Ovtchinnikov, Alexei V., 2016. "Debt decisions in deregulated industries," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 230-254.
    13. Thomas Dangl & Josef Zechner, 2021. "Debt Maturity and the Dynamics of Leverage [Rollover risk and market freezes]," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 34(12), pages 5796-5840.
    14. Rana Yassir Hussain Xuezhou Wen Rehan Sohail Butt Haroon Hussain Sikandar Ali Qalati Irfan Abbas, 2020. "Are Growth Led Financing Decisions Causing Insolvency in Listed Firms of Pakistan?," Zagreb International Review of Economics and Business, Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Zagreb, vol. 23(2), pages 89-115, November.
    15. Vina Christina Nugroho & Kim Sung Suk, 2019. "The Relationship Between Leverage, Maturity, And Investment Decision: Evidence From Emerging Markets," Organizations and Markets in Emerging Economies, Faculty of Economics, Vilnius University, vol. 10(1).
    16. Wang, Chih-Wei & Chiu, Wan-Chien & Peña, Juan Ignacio, 2017. "Effect of rollover risk on default risk: Evidence from bank financing," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 130-143.
    17. Gao, Ning & Jiang, Wei & Jin, Jiaxu, 2023. "Disproportional control rights and debt maturity," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    18. Jorge A. Muñoz Mendoza & Sandra M. Sepúlveda Yelpo & Carmen L. Veloso Ramos, 2019. "Non-linear Effects of Ownership Structure, Growth Opportunities and Leverage on Debt Maturity in Chilean Firms," Remef - Revista Mexicana de Economía y Finanzas Nueva Época REMEF (The Mexican Journal of Economics and Finance), Instituto Mexicano de Ejecutivos de Finanzas, IMEF, vol. 14(1), pages 21-40, Enero-Mar.
    19. Inder K. Khurana & Changjiang Wang, 2015. "Debt Maturity Structure and Accounting Conservatism," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(1-2), pages 167-203, January.
    20. Custódio, Cláudia & Ferreira, Miguel A. & Laureano, Luís, 2013. "Why are US firms using more short-term debt?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(1), pages 182-212.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jfinan:v:69:y:2014:i:2:p:719-762. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/afaaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.