Knowledge that Transforms

I test the hypothesis that short debt maturity attenuates the negative effect of growth opportunities on leverage. Using simultaneous equations with leverage and maturity endogenous, I find strong support for an economically significant attenuation effect. The negative effect of growth opportunities on leverage for firms with all shorter-term debt is less than one-sixth as large as the effect for firms with all longer-term debt. Short maturity also increases liquidity risk, however, which negatively affects leverage. The results suggest that firms trade off the cost of underinvestment problems against the cost of liquidity risk when choosing short maturity.

This article uses a new dataset of credit card accounts to analyze credit card delinquency, personal bankruptcy, and the stability of credit risk models. We estimate duration models for default and assess the relative importance of different variables in predicting default. We investigate how the propensity to default has changed over time, disentangling the two leading explanations for the recent increase in default rates—a deterioration in the risk composition of borrowers versus an increase in borrowers’ willingness to default due to declines in default costs. Even after controlling for risk composition and economic fundamentals, the propensity to default significantly increased between 1995 and 1997. Standard default models missed an important time-varying default factor, consistent with a decline in default costs.

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An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

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In recent years, interest-rate modeling has developed rapidly in terms of both practice and theory. In this book, Riccardo Rebonato draws on his academic and professional experience to bring together and build on what theory and trading have to offer.

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Abstract Recent research has found that the value‐relevance of accounting variables depends not only on whether a country's accounting rules are code‐law oriented or common‐law oriented, but also on the reporting incentives created by the legal and business environment in which a firm operates. Therefore, for example, the earnings of firms in some countries with common‐law oriented rules but with code‐law incentives have more code‐law‐type characteristics. We further this research by examining whether this is true for firms facing the same accounting regime and institutional environment but different stakeholder‐related incentives. We find significant stakeholder‐related incentives across 23 Japanese firms listed in the United States and 23 Japanese firms not listed in the United States that are matched by industry and size. Although these firms face the same institutional environment and the same accounting regime, consistent with the differences in stakeholder‐related incentives, the earnings and book values of the firms listed in the more shareholder‐oriented U.S. markets have significantly more explanatory power for market value than those for firms not cross‐listed in the United States. These findings are unaffected by whether the reports are based on consolidated or parent‐only accounting or whether they are based on U.S. or Japanese GAAP, emphasizing the potential influence of reporting incentives at all levels on the effect of standardization, conversion, or harmonization of accounting methods globally.