IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/hal-01845006.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Access to Finance for French Firms: Do boardroom attributes matter?

Author

Listed:
  • Ramzi Benkraiem

    (Audencia Business School)

  • Hamrouni Amal

    (Groupe Sup de Co La Rochelle)

  • Anthony Miloudi

    (Groupe Sup de Co La Rochelle, CRIEF [Poitiers] - Centre de recherche sur l'intégration économique et financière - UP - Université de Poitiers = University of Poitiers)

  • Ali Uyar

    (Groupe Sup de Co La Rochelle)

Abstract

This article aims at studying the influence of boardroom attributes on access to leverage in the French context. The empirical findings lead to several interesting results. They reveal a negative relation between the number of female directors on the board and the total and long-term leverage ratios. Due likely to the risk aversion of women, firms with more gender-diverse boards appear to use less levels of debt. This is consistent with the pecking order theory. The results also show that the size of the board, the frequency of its meetings and the average age of its independent directors positively affect the leverage ratios. They are coherent with the disciplinary role of the board stipulated by the agency theory.

Suggested Citation

  • Ramzi Benkraiem & Hamrouni Amal & Anthony Miloudi & Ali Uyar, 2018. "Access to Finance for French Firms: Do boardroom attributes matter?," Post-Print hal-01845006, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-01845006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ramzi Benkraiem & Amal Hamrouni & Faten Lakhal & Nadia Ben Farhat Toumi, 2017. "Board independence, gender diversity and CEO compensation," Post-Print hal-01590712, HAL.
    2. Berens, James L & Cuny, Charles J, 1995. "The Capital Structure Puzzle Revisited," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 8(4), pages 1185-1208.
    3. Rohail Hassan & Maran Marimuthu, 2016. "Corporate Governance, Board Diversity, and Firm Value: Examining Large Companies Using Panel Data Approach," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 36(3), pages 1737-1750.
    4. Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1997. "A Survey of Corporate Governance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(2), pages 737-783, June.
    5. Yu Wen & Kami Rwegasira & Jan Bilderbeek, 2002. "Corporate Governance and Capital Structure Decisions of the Chinese Listed Firms," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 10(2), pages 75-83, April.
    6. Alves, Paulo & Couto, Eduardo Barbosa & Francisco, Paulo Morais, 2015. "Board of directors’ composition and capital structure," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 1-32.
    7. Firth, Michael & Lin, Chen & Wong, Sonia M.L., 2008. "Leverage and investment under a state-owned bank lending environment: Evidence from China," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 14(5), pages 642-653, December.
    8. Lo, Huai-Chun & Ting, Irene Wei Kiong & Kweh, Qian Long & Yang, Ming Jing, 2016. "Nonlinear association between ownership concentration and leverage: The role of family control," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 113-123.
    9. Hermalin, Benjamin E & Weisbach, Michael S, 1998. "Endogenously Chosen Boards of Directors and Their Monitoring of the CEO," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(1), pages 96-118, March.
    10. Grace C.‐M. Hsu & Ping‐Sheng Koh, 2005. "Does the Presence of Institutional Investors Influence Accruals Management? Evidence from Australia," Corporate Governance: An International Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(6), pages 809-823, November.
    11. Nina Smith & Valdemar Smith & Mette Verner, 2006. "Do women in top management affect firm performance?A panel study of 2,500 Danish firms," International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 55(7), pages 569-593, October.
    12. Schmid, Thomas, 2013. "Control considerations, creditor monitoring, and the capital structure of family firms," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(2), pages 257-272.
    13. Candida G. Brush, 1992. "Research on Women Business Owners: Past Trends, a New Perspective and Future Directions," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 16(4), pages 5-30, July.
    14. Godfred A. Bokpin & Anastacia C. Arko, 2009. "Ownership structure, corporate governance and capital structure decisions of firms," Studies in Economics and Finance, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 26(4), pages 246-256, October.
    15. Li-Kai (Connie) Liao & Tarun Mukherjee & Wei Wang, 2015. "Corporate Governance And Capital Structure Dynamics: An Empirical Study," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 38(2), pages 169-192, June.
    16. Masanori Orihara, 2017. "Board independence and a shareholder's commitment," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 37(2), pages 846-852.
    17. Elif Akben Selcuk & Pinar Sener, 2018. "Corporate Governance and Tunneling: Empirical Evidence from Turkey," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 38(1), pages 349-361.
    18. Indrarini Laksmana, 2008. "Corporate Board Governance and Voluntary Disclosure of Executive Compensation Practices," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 25(4), pages 1147-1182, December.
    19. Myers, Stewart C., 1984. "Capital structure puzzle," Working papers 1548-84., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Sloan School of Management.
    20. Nadia Ben Farhat Toumi & Ramzi Benkraiem & Amal Hamrouni, 2016. "Board director disciplinary and cognitive influence on corporate value creation," Post-Print hal-01363698, HAL.
    21. Myers, Stewart C, 1984. "The Capital Structure Puzzle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 39(3), pages 575-592, July.
    22. Aivazian, Varouj A. & Ge, Ying & Qiu, Jiaping, 2005. "The impact of leverage on firm investment: Canadian evidence," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 11(1-2), pages 277-291, March.
    23. Fama, Eugene F, 1980. "Agency Problems and the Theory of the Firm," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 88(2), pages 288-307, April.
    24. Benjamin E. Hermalin & Michael S. Weisbach, 2003. "Boards of directors as an endogenously determined institution: a survey of the economic literature," Economic Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 9(Apr), pages 7-26.
    25. Buttner, E. Holly & Rosen, Benson, 1989. "Funding new business ventures: Are decision makers biased against women entrepreneurs?," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 4(4), pages 249-261, July.
    26. Stewart C. Myers, 1984. "Capital Structure Puzzle," NBER Working Papers 1393, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    27. Coles, Jeffrey L. & Daniel, Naveen D. & Naveen, Lalitha, 2008. "Boards: Does one size fit all," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 329-356, February.
    28. Fabrizio Rossi & Richard J. Cebula, 2015. "Does the Board of Directors Affect the Extent of Corporate R&D? Evidence from Italian listed companies," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 35(4), pages 2567-2580.
    29. Buttner, E. Holly & Rosen, Benson, 1988. "Bank loan officers' perceptions of the characteristics of men, women, and successful entrepreneurs," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 3(3), pages 249-258.
    30. Faccio, Mara & Marchica, Maria-Teresa & Mura, Roberto, 2016. "CEO gender, corporate risk-taking, and the efficiency of capital allocation," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 193-209.
    31. Berger, Philip G & Ofek, Eli & Yermack, David L, 1997. "Managerial Entrenchment and Capital Structure Decisions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(4), pages 1411-1438, September.
    32. 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.
    33. Chang, Ya-Kai & Chou, Robin K. & Huang, Tai-Hsin, 2014. "Corporate governance and the dynamics of capital structure: New evidence," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 374-385.
    34. Jianakoplos, Nancy Ammon & Bernasek, Alexandra, 1998. "Are Women More Risk Averse?," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(4), pages 620-630, October.
    35. Jiraporn, Pornsit & Singh, Manohar & Lee, Chun I., 2009. "Ineffective corporate governance: Director busyness and board committee memberships," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(5), pages 819-828, May.
    36. Iliev, Peter & Roth, Lukas, 2018. "Learning from directors' foreign board experiences," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 1-19.
    37. Carmen Lorca & Juan Sánchez-Ballesta & Emma García-Meca, 2011. "Board Effectiveness and Cost of Debt," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 100(4), pages 613-631, June.
    38. Titman, Sheridan & Wessels, Roberto, 1988. " The Determinants of Capital Structure Choice," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 43(1), pages 1-19, March.
    39. Fama, Eugene F & Jensen, Michael C, 1983. "Separation of Ownership and Control," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 26(2), pages 301-325, June.
    40. Renee B. Adams & Hamid Mehran, 2003. "Is corporate governance different for bank holding companies?," Economic Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 9(Apr), pages 123-142.
    41. Chandra S. Mishra & Daniel L. Mcconaughy, 1999. "Founding Family Control and Capital Structure: The Risk of Loss of Control and the Aversion to Debt," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 23(4), pages 53-64, July.
    42. Hadiye Aslan & Praveen Kumar, 2012. "Strategic Ownership Structure and the Cost of Debt," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 25(7), pages 2257-2299.
    43. Lin, Chen & Ma, Yue & Malatesta, Paul & Xuan, Yuhai, 2013. "Corporate ownership structure and the choice between bank debt and public debt," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(2), pages 517-534.
    44. Khaled Hussainey & Khaled Aljifri, 2012. "Corporate governance mechanisms and capital structure in UAE," Journal of Applied Accounting Research, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 13(2), pages 145-160, September.
    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. Pornsit Jiraporn & Mondher Bouattour & Amal Hamrouni & Ali Uyar, 2019. "Does board gender diversity influence dividend policy? Evidence from France," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 39(4), pages 2942-2954.

    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. Nguyen, Thao & Bai, Min & Hou, Yang & Vu, Manh-Chien, 2021. "Corporate governance and dynamics capital structure: evidence from Vietnam," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    2. Alves, Paulo & Couto, Eduardo Barbosa & Francisco, Paulo Morais, 2015. "Board of directors’ composition and capital structure," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 1-32.
    3. Alves, Paulo & Couto, Eduardo & Francisco, Paulo, 2014. "Board of directors’ composition and financing choices," MPRA Paper 52973, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2014.
    4. Mário Santos & António Moreira & Elisabete Vieira, 2014. "Ownership concentration, contestability, family firms, and capital structure," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 18(4), pages 1063-1107, November.
    5. Naeem Tabassum & Satwinder Singh, 2020. "Corporate Governance and Organisational Performance," Springer Books, Springer, number 978-3-030-48527-6, September.
    6. Henrique Castro Martins & Cristiano Machado Costa, 2020. "Does control concentration affect board busyness? International evidence," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 24(3), pages 821-850, September.
    7. McGuinness, Paul B., 2021. "Board member age, stock seasoning and the evolution of capital structure in Chinese firms," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(3).
    8. Abdullahi Sani, 2020. "CEO Tenure and Financing Decisions of Nigerian Non-Financial Listed Firms: A Dynamic Panel Approach," Journal of Accounting, Business and Finance Research, Scientific Publishing Institute, vol. 10(2), pages 76-83.
    9. Saleh F.A. Khatib & Dewi Fariha Abdullah & Ali Shariff Kabara & Saddam A. Hazaea & Tamil Selvi Rajoo, 2020. "Does Debts have any Impact on Governance Bundle and Agency Costs? Over-Governance Hypothesis," Technium Social Sciences Journal, Technium Science, vol. 9(1), pages 384-396, July.
    10. Hussein Abedi Shamsabadi & Byung-Seong Min & Richard Chung, 2016. "Corporate governance and dividend strategy: lessons from Australia," International Journal of Managerial Finance, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 12(5), pages 583-610, October.
    11. Theophilus Lartey & Kwabena Kesse & Albert Danso, 2020. "Ceo Extraversion And Capital Structure Decisions: The Role Of Firm Dynamics, Product Market Competition, And Financial Crisis," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 43(4), pages 847-893, December.
    12. DasGupta, Ranjan & Dhochak, Monika, 2021. "Risk-Antecedents of Firms and Strategic Mediators – New Evidence from a Cross-Country Analysis," American Business Review, Pompea College of Business, University of New Haven, vol. 24(1), pages 3-35, May.
    13. Fabrizio Rossi & Richard J. Cebula & James R. Barth, 2018. "Female representation in the boardroom and firm debt: empirical evidence from Italy," Journal of Economics and Finance, Springer;Academy of Economics and Finance, vol. 42(2), pages 315-338, April.
    14. Wiwattanakantang, Yupana, 1999. "An empirical study on the determinants of the capital structure of Thai firms," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 7(3-4), pages 371-403, August.
    15. Hassan Ahmad & Nasreen Akhter & Tariq Siddiq & Zahid Iqbal, 2018. "Ownership Structure, Corporate Governance and Capital Structure of Non-Financial Firms of Pakistan," Information Management and Business Review, AMH International, vol. 10(1), pages 31-46.
    16. 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.
    17. Lartey, Theophilus & Danso, Albert & Boateng, Agyenim, 2021. "Co-opted boards and capital structure dynamics," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    18. Hang, Markus & Geyer-Klingeberg, Jerome & Rathgeber, Andreas W. & Stöckl, Stefan, 2018. "Measurement matters—A meta-study of the determinants of corporate capital structure," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 211-225.
    19. Faisal Seraj Alnori & Ali Mohsen Shaddady, 2019. "Corporate Debt Choice and Board Size: The Case of Oil Exporting Economy," Journal of Applied Finance & Banking, SCIENPRESS Ltd, vol. 9(5), pages 1-6.
    20. Vo, Xuan Vinh, 2017. "Determinants of capital structure in emerging markets: Evidence from Vietnam," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 105-113.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Financing policy; boardroom attributes; leverage; France;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G3 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance

    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:hal:journl:hal-01845006. 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: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    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.