IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/sfb649/sfb649dp2009-024.html

Incorporating the dynamics of leverage into default prediction

Author

Listed:
  • Löffler, Gunter
  • Maurer, Alina

Abstract

A firm's current leverage ratio is one of the core characteristics of credit quality used in statistical default prediction models. Based on the capital structure literature, which shows that leverage is mean-reverting to a target leverage, we forecast future leverage ratios and include them in the set of default risk drivers. The analysis is done with a discrete duration model. Out-of-sample analysis of default events two to five years ahead reveals that the discriminating power of the duration model increases substantially when leverage forecasts are included. We further document that credit ratings contain information beyond the one contained in standard variables but that this information is unrelated to forecasts of leverage ratios.

Suggested Citation

  • Löffler, Gunter & Maurer, Alina, 2009. "Incorporating the dynamics of leverage into default prediction," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2009-024, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:sfb649:sfb649dp2009-024
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/25340/1/598740201.PDF
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hovakimian, Armen & Opler, Tim & Titman, Sheridan, 2001. "The Debt-Equity Choice," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 36(1), pages 1-24, March.
    2. Duffie, Darrell & Saita, Leandro & Wang, Ke, 2007. "Multi-period corporate default prediction with stochastic covariates," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(3), pages 635-665, March.
    3. Marshall E. Blume & Felix Lim & A. Craig MacKinlay, "undated". "The Declining Credit Quality of US Corporate Debt: Myth or Reality?," Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research Working Papers 3-98, Wharton School Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research.
    4. Eugene F. Fama, 2002. "Testing Trade-Off and Pecking Order Predictions About Dividends and Debt," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 15(1), pages 1-33, March.
    5. Pierre Collin‐Dufresne & Robert S. Goldstein, 2001. "Do Credit Spreads Reflect Stationary Leverage Ratios?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(5), pages 1929-1957, October.
    6. Malcolm Baker & Jeffrey Wurgler, 2002. "Market Timing and Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(1), pages 1-32, February.
    7. Kraus, Alan & Litzenberger, Robert H, 1973. "A State-Preference Model of Optimal Financial Leverage," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 28(4), pages 911-922, September.
    8. Mitchell A. Petersen, 2009. "Estimating Standard Errors in Finance Panel Data Sets: Comparing Approaches," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(1), pages 435-480, January.
    9. Rajan, Raghuram G & Zingales, Luigi, 1995. "What Do We Know about Capital Structure? Some Evidence from International Data," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(5), pages 1421-1460, December.
    10. Sudheer Chava & Robert A. Jarrow, 2008. "Bankruptcy Prediction with Industry Effects," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Financial Derivatives Pricing Selected Works of Robert Jarrow, chapter 21, pages 517-549, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    11. repec:bla:jfinan:v:53:y:1998:i:4:p:1389-1413 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Edward I. Altman, 1968. "Financial Ratios, Discriminant Analysis And The Prediction Of Corporate Bankruptcy," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 23(4), pages 589-609, September.
    13. Michael L. Lemmon & Michael R. Roberts & Jaime F. Zender, 2008. "Back to the Beginning: Persistence and the Cross‐Section of Corporate Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(4), pages 1575-1608, August.
    14. Graham, John R. & Harvey, Campbell R., 2001. "The theory and practice of corporate finance: evidence from the field," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(2-3), pages 187-243, May.
    15. Shumway, Tyler, 2001. "Forecasting Bankruptcy More Accurately: A Simple Hazard Model," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 74(1), pages 101-124, January.
    16. C. F. Lo & T. C. Wong & C. H. Hui & M. X. Huang, 2008. "Assessing Credit Risk of Companies with Mean-Reverting Leverage Ratios," Working Papers 042008, Hong Kong Institute for Monetary Research.
    17. Ohlson, Ja, 1980. "Financial Ratios And The Probabilistic Prediction Of Bankruptcy," Journal of Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 18(1), pages 109-131.
    18. Zmijewski, Me, 1984. "Methodological Issues Related To The Estimation Of Financial Distress Prediction Models," Journal of Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22, pages 59-82.
    19. repec:fth:pennfi:67 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Mark T. Leary & Michael R. Roberts, 2005. "Do Firms Rebalance Their Capital Structures?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(6), pages 2575-2619, December.
    21. Darren J. Kisgen, 2006. "Credit Ratings and Capital Structure," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(3), pages 1035-1072, June.
    22. Marshall E. Blume & Felix Lim & A. Craig MacKinlay, "undated". "The Declining Credit Quality of US Corporate Debt: Myth or Reality?," Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research Working Papers 03-98, Wharton School Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research.
    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. repec:hum:wpaper:sfb649dp2009-024 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Löffler, Gunter & Maurer, Alina, 2011. "Incorporating the dynamics of leverage into default prediction," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(12), pages 3351-3361.
    3. Hess, Dieter & Immenkötter, Philipp, 2014. "How much is too much? Debt capacity and financial flexibility," CFR Working Papers 14-03, University of Cologne, Centre for Financial Research (CFR).
    4. Elsas, Ralf & Florysiak, David, 2008. "Empirical Capital Structure Research: New Ideas, Recent Evidence, and Methodological Issues," Discussion Papers in Business Administration 4743, University of Munich, Munich School of Management.
    5. Pinnuck, Matt & Shekhar, Chander, 2013. "The profit versus loss heuristic and firm financing decisions," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 38(6), pages 420-439.
    6. Shoaib Ali & Attiya Yasmin Javid, 2015. "Relationship between Credit Rating, Capital Structure and Earning Management Behaviour: Evidence from Pakistani Listed Firms," PIDE-Working Papers 2015:121, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics.
    7. Lyandres, Evgeny, 2010. "Target leverage and the costs of issuing seasoned equity," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 7(1), pages 39-52, March.
    8. Andres, Christian & Cumming, Douglas & Karabiber, Timur & Schweizer, Denis, 2014. "Do markets anticipate capital structure decisions? — Feedback effects in equity liquidity," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 133-156.
    9. Murray Z. Frank & Vidhan K. Goyal, 2009. "Capital Structure Decisions: Which Factors Are Reliably Important?," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 38(1), pages 1-37, March.
    10. Tang, Tony T., 2009. "Information asymmetry and firms' credit market access: Evidence from Moody's credit rating format refinement," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(2), pages 325-351, August.
    11. Jens Hilscher & Mungo Wilson, 2017. "Credit Ratings and Credit Risk: Is One Measure Enough?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(10), pages 3414-3437, October.
    12. Borochin, Paul & Yang, Jie, 2017. "Options, equity risks, and the value of capital structure adjustments," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 150-178.
    13. Wu, Xueping & Au Yeung, Chau Kin, 2012. "Firm growth type and capital structure persistence," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 36(12), pages 3427-3443.
    14. Aggarwal, Nidhi & Singh, Manish K. & Thomas, Susan, 2023. "Do decreases in Distance-to-Default predict rating downgrades?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    15. Xu, Jin, 2012. "Profitability and capital structure: Evidence from import penetration," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(2), pages 427-446.
    16. repec:osf:osfxxx:3d7v4_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Amini, Shahram & Elmore, Ryan & Öztekin, Özde & Strauss, Jack, 2021. "Can machines learn capital structure dynamics?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    18. Agliardi, Elettra & Amel-Zadeh, Amir & Koussis, Nicos, 2016. "Leverage changes and growth options in mergers and acquisitions," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 37-58.
    19. Benzion, Uri & Galil, Koresh & Lahav, Eyal & Shapir, Offer Moshe, 2018. "Debt composition and lax screening in the corporate bond market," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 178-189.
    20. Joye Khoo & Robert B. Durand & Subhrendu Rath, 2017. "Leverage adjustment after mergers and acquisitions," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 57, pages 185-210, April.
    21. George, Thomas J. & Hwang, Chuan-Yang, 2010. "A resolution of the distress risk and leverage puzzles in the cross section of stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(1), pages 56-79, April.
    22. Ebrahim, M. Shahid & Girma, Sourafel & Shah, M. Eskandar & Williams, Jonathan, 2014. "Dynamic capital structure and political patronage: The case of Malaysia," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 117-128.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill
    • G33 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Bankruptcy; Liquidation

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:zbw:sfb649:sfb649dp2009-024. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sohubde.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.