IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/jecfin/v25y2001i1p80-99.html

Corporate borrowing and growth option value: The limited liability effect

Author

Listed:
  • Jyh-Bang Jou

Abstract

A firm issues bonds before undertaking a risky continuous investment project that is costly to later either expand or contract. The firm’s existing debt load causes it to install a smaller capacity because equity has limited liability. This lowers debt value, but such a cost should be borne by equityholders because debtholders will rationally anticipate equityholders’ future behavior. The firm’s choice of debt levels balances this agency cost against the tax shield benefit. As the firm incurs higher costs to later expand capacity, its growth option value becomes lower. The simulation results of this article are in line with Myers’ conjecture (1977), which states that a firm’s debt capacity is inversely related to its growth option value. Copyright Springer 2001

Suggested Citation

  • Jyh-Bang Jou, 2001. "Corporate borrowing and growth option value: The limited liability effect," Journal of Economics and Finance, Springer;Academy of Economics and Finance, vol. 25(1), pages 80-99, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:jecfin:v:25:y:2001:i:1:p:80-99
    DOI: 10.1007/BF02759688
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/BF02759688
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/BF02759688?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Avinash K. Dixit & Robert S. Pindyck, 1994. "Investment under Uncertainty," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 5474.
    2. Bradley, Michael & Jarrell, Gregg A & Kim, E Han, 1984. "On the Existence of an Optimal Capital Structure: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 39(3), pages 857-878, July.
    3. Haugen, Robert A & Senbet, Lemma W, 1978. "The Insignificance of Bankruptcy Costs to the Theory of Optimal Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 33(2), pages 383-393, May.
    4. Gaver, Jennifer J. & Gaver, Kenneth M., 1993. "Additional evidence on the association between the investment opportunity set and corporate financing, dividend, and compensation policies," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(1-3), pages 125-160, April.
    5. Warner, Jerold B, 1977. "Bankruptcy Costs: Some Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 32(2), pages 337-347, May.
    6. Tobin, James, 1969. "A General Equilibrium Approach to Monetary Theory," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 1(1), pages 15-29, February.
    7. Jou, Jyh-Bang, 2001. "Entry, financing, and bankruptcy decisions: The limited liability effect," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 69-88.
    8. 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)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sudipto Sarkar, 2020. "The relationship between operating leverage and financial leverage," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 60(S1), pages 805-826, April.

    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. Alderson, Michael J. & Betker, Brian L., 1995. "Liquidation costs and capital structure," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 45-69, September.
    2. Sanjiva Prasad & Christopher J. Green & Victor Murinde, 2005. "Company Financial Structure: A Survey and Implications for Developing Economies," Chapters, in: Christopher J. Green & Colin Kirkpatrick & Victor Murinde (ed.), Finance and Development, chapter 12, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    3. T. Pham & D. Chow, 1989. "Some Estimates of Direct and Indirect Bankruptcy Costs in Australia: September 1978–May 1983," Australian Journal of Management, Australian School of Business, vol. 14(1), pages 75-95, June.
    4. Sanjiva Prasad & Christopher J. Green & Victor Murinde, 2001. "Company Financing, Captial Structure, and Ownership: A Survey, and Implications for Developing Economies," SUERF Studies, SUERF - The European Money and Finance Forum, number 12 edited by Morten Balling, May.
    5. Nestor Bruno & Marcelo Pedro Dabos & Fernando Andrés Grozs, 2021. "Determinantes de la estructura de capital: un survey con énfasis en Latinoamérica," Asociación Argentina de Economía Política: Working Papers 4444, Asociación Argentina de Economía Política.
    6. Ogden, Joseph P. & Wu, Shanhong, 2013. "Reassessing the effect of growth options on leverage," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 23(C), pages 182-195.
    7. Khaled Ba-Abbad & Nurwati Ashikkin Ahmad-Zaluki, 2012. "The Determinants of Capital Structure of Qatari Listed Companies," International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, Human Resource Management Academic Research Society, International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, vol. 2(2), pages 93-108, April.
    8. Barakat, Mounther-Hussein & Rao, Ramesh-P, 2003. "The role of taxes in capital structure: evidence from taxed and non-taxed Arab economies," MPRA Paper 25472, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Aug 2006.
    9. Jianjun Miao, 2005. "Optimal Capital Structure and Industry Dynamics," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(6), pages 2621-2659, December.
    10. Nasrin Yousefzadeh & Zeinab Aazami & Hilda Shamsadini & Mina Abousaiedi, 2014. "Dete rminants of Capital Structure of Iranian Companies Listed in Tehran Stock Exchange: A Structural Equation Modeling Approach," Indian Journal of Commerce and Management Studies, Educational Research Multimedia & Publications,India, vol. 5(2), pages 73-81, May.
    11. Hege, Ulrich, 2003. "Workouts, court-supervised reorganization and the choice between private and public debt," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 233-269, March.
    12. Cieply Sylvie, 2001. "The Radical Change of French Firms’ Financial Characteristics. Macroeconomic Consequences and Lessons for Political Economics / Die französische Finanzrevolution. Die Folgen für die Finanzstruktur der," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 221(5-6), pages 556-576, October.
    13. Michel Poitevin, 1989. "Information et marchés financiers : une revue de littérature," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 65(4), pages 555-589.
    14. Lyandres, Evgeny, 2010. "Target leverage and the costs of issuing seasoned equity," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 39-52, March.
    15. Twine, Edgar E. & Kiiza, Barnabas & Bashaasha, Bernard, 2015. "The Flexible Accelerator Model of Investment: An Application to Ugandan Tea- Processing Firms," African Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, African Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 10(01), pages 1-15, March.
    16. Tarun Sabarwal, 2005. "The non-neutrality of debt in investment timing: a new NPV rule," Annals of Finance, Springer, vol. 1(4), pages 433-445, October.
    17. Francisco Sogorb- Mira, 2002. "How Sme Uniqueness Affects Capital Structure: Evidence From A 1994-1998 Spanish Data Panel," Working Papers. Serie EC 2002-18, Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, S.A. (Ivie).
    18. Zélia Serrasqueiro & Ana Caetano, 2015. "Trade-Off Theory versus Pecking Order Theory: capital structure decisions in a peripheral region of Portugal," Journal of Business Economics and Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(2), pages 445-466, April.
    19. Bjuggren, Per-Olof, 1995. "A transaction cost perspective on financial distress and capital structure," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 395-404, December.
    20. Wald, John, 1999. "Capital structure with dividend restrictions," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 5(2), pages 193-208, June.

    More about this item

    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:spr:jecfin:v:25:y:2001:i:1:p:80-99. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.