IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cen/wpaper/93-3.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

LBOs, Debt And R&D Intensity

Author

Listed:
  • David J Ravenscraft
  • William F Long

Abstract

This paper details the impact of debt on R&D intensity for firms undergoing a leveraged buyout (LBO). We develop seven hypotheses based on capital market imperfection theories and agency theory. To test these hypotheses, we compare 72 R&D performing LBOs with 3329 non-LBO control observations and 126 LBOs with little or no R&D expenditures. The regressions yield four statistically significant major findings. First, pre-LBO R&D intensity is roughly one-half of the overall manufacturing mean and two-thirds of the firm's industry mean. Second, LBOs cause R&D intensity to drop by 40 percent. Third, large firms tend to have smaller LBO- related declines in R&D intensity. Fourth, R&D intensive LBOs outperform both their non-LBO industry peers and other LBOs without R&D expenditures.

Suggested Citation

  • David J Ravenscraft & William F Long, 1993. "LBOs, Debt And R&D Intensity," Working Papers 93-3, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    • Handle: RePEc:cen:wpaper:93-3
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www2.census.gov/ces/wp/1993/CES-WP-93-03.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Williamson, Oliver E, 1988. " Corporate Finance and Corporate Governance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 43(3), pages 567-591, July.
    2. Lawrence G. Franko, 1989. "Global corporate competition: Who's winning, who's losing, and the R&D factor as one reason why," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 10(5), pages 449-474, September.
    3. Lichtenberg, Frank R. & Siegel, Donald, 1990. "The effects of leveraged buyouts on productivity and related aspects of firm behavior," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 165-194, September.
    4. Jensen, Michael C, 1986. "Agency Costs of Free Cash Flow, Corporate Finance, and Takeovers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(2), pages 323-329, May.
    5. Chan, Su Han & Martin, John D. & Kensinger, John W., 1990. "Corporate research and development expenditures and share value," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 255-276, August.
    6. Douglas W. Diamond, 1984. "Financial Intermediation and Delegated Monitoring," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 51(3), pages 393-414.
    7. Kaplan, Steven, 1989. "The effects of management buyouts on operating performance and value," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(2), pages 217-254.
    8. Cohen, Wesley M & Levinthal, Daniel A, 1989. "Innovation and Learning: The Two Faces of R&D," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 99(397), pages 569-596, September.
    9. Robin Marris, 1963. "A Model of the "Managerial" Enterprise," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 77(2), pages 185-209.
    10. Myers, Stewart C., 1984. "Capital structure puzzle," Working papers 1548-84., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Sloan School of Management.
    11. Myers, Stewart C, 1984. "The Capital Structure Puzzle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 39(3), pages 575-592, July.
    12. Stewart C. Myers, 1984. "Capital Structure Puzzle," NBER Working Papers 1393, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Charles R. Schwenk, 1984. "Cognitive simplification processes in strategic decision‐making," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 5(2), pages 111-128, April.
    14. Bronwyn H. Hall, 1990. "The Impact of Corporate Restructuring on Industrial Research and Development," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 21(1990 Micr), pages 85-135.
    15. Boot, Arnoud W A, 1992. "Why Hang on to Losers? Divestitures and Takeovers," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 47(4), pages 1401-1423, September.
    16. David F. Scott & William G. Jens & Raymond E. Spudeck, 1991. "Analysis," Challenge, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(6), pages 58-60, November.
    17. Kenneth Lehn & Annette Poulsen, 1989. "Free Cash Flow and Stockholder Gains in Going Private Transactions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 44(3), pages 771-787, July.
    18. 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.
    19. Leland, Hayne E & Pyle, David H, 1977. "Informational Asymmetries, Financial Structure, and Financial Intermediation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 32(2), pages 371-387, May.
    20. Randall Morck & Andrei Shleifer & Robert W. Vishny, 1988. "Characteristics of Targets of Hostile and Friendly Takeovers," NBER Chapters, in: Corporate Takeovers: Causes and Consequences, pages 101-136, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    21. Sudipto Bhattacharya & Jay R. Ritter, 1983. "Innovation and Communication: Signalling with Partial Disclosure," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 50(2), pages 331-346.
    22. Lehn, Kenneth & Poulsen, Annette, 1989. " Free Cash Flow and Stockholder Gains in Going Private Transactions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 44(3), pages 771-787, July.
    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. David J Ravenscraft & William F Long, 1993. "The Financial Performance of Whole Company LBOs," Working Papers 93-16, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    2. Ampenberger, Markus & Schmid, Thomas & Achleitner, Ann-Kristin & Kaserer, Christoph, 2009. "Capital structure decisions in family firms: empirical evidence from a bank-based economy," CEFS Working Paper Series 2009-05, Technische Universität München (TUM), Center for Entrepreneurial and Financial Studies (CEFS).
    3. Kim, Sang-Joon & Bae, John & Oh, Hannah, 2019. "Financing strategically: The moderation effect of marketing activities on the bifurcated relationship between debt level and firm valuation of small and medium enterprises," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 663-681.
    4. 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.
    5. Rizov, Marian, 2008. "Corporate capital structure and how soft budget constraints may affect it," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 22(4), pages 648-684.
    6. Bronwyn H. Hall, 1990. "The Impact of Corporate Restructuring on Industrial Research and Development," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 21(1990 Micr), pages 85-135.
    7. César Camisón & José Antonio Clemente & Sergio Camisón-Haba, 2022. "Asset tangibility, information asymmetries and intangibles as determinants of family firms leverage," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 16(7), pages 2047-2082, October.
    8. İbrahim Yarba & Z. Nuray Güner, 2020. "Leverage dynamics: Do financial development and government leverage matter? Evidence from a major developing economy," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 59(5), pages 2473-2507, November.
    9. Huang, Kershen & Shang, Chenguang, 2019. "Leverage, debt maturity, and social capital," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 26-46.
    10. Mario Fischer, 2015. "Challenging the payment effect in bank-financed takeovers," Journal of Management Control: Zeitschrift für Planung und Unternehmenssteuerung, Springer, vol. 26(4), pages 347-376, October.
    11. 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.
    12. Demirguc-Kunt, Asli, 1992. "Developing country capital structures and emerging stock markets," Policy Research Working Paper Series 933, The World Bank.
    13. Gao, Ning, 2011. "The adverse selection effect of corporate cash reserve: Evidence from acquisitions solely financed by stock," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 17(4), pages 789-808, September.
    14. Patrick Artus & Philippe Ducos & Francois Lecointe, 1992. "Rachats d'entreprise avec endettement (LBO et MBO) : motivations micro-économiques, effets sur l'efficacité des entreprises et risques macro-économiques," Économie et Prévision, Programme National Persée, vol. 102(1), pages 89-104.
    15. Bange, Mary M. & De Bondt, Werner F. M., 1998. "R&D budgets and corporate earnings targets," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 4(2), pages 153-184, June.
    16. Cheng, Yuxi & Katchova, Ani, 2018. "Cooperatives capital structure adjustment during the agricultural downturn," 2018 Annual Meeting, August 5-7, Washington, D.C. 273788, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    17. Martinsson, Gustav, 2009. "Finance and R&D Investments - is there a debt overhang effect on R&D investments?," Working Paper Series in Economics and Institutions of Innovation 174, Royal Institute of Technology, CESIS - Centre of Excellence for Science and Innovation Studies.
    18. Samet, Marwa & Jarboui, Anis, 2017. "How does corporate social responsibility contribute to investment efficiency?," Journal of Multinational Financial Management, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 33-46.
    19. Hanka, Gordon, 1998. "Debt and the terms of employment," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(3), pages 245-282, June.
    20. Ozkan, Aydin & Ozkan, Neslihan, 2004. "Corporate cash holdings: An empirical investigation of UK companies," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(9), pages 2103-2134, September.

    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:cen:wpaper:93-3. 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: Dawn Anderson (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesgvus.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.