The Effect of Firms’ Characteristics and Moderating Role of Government Ownership on Capital Structure in Tehran Stock Exchange

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Department of Management, Islamic Azad University, Neyshabur Branch, Iran

10.22034/iaas.2014.103528

Abstract

This paper investigates the effect of firms’ characteristics on leverage ratios of affiliated and unaffiliated firms in Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE), using data from 200 non-financial listed companies over the five-year period. A regression model with dummy variable and t-statistic has been used to test the six hypotheses. The results show a significant negative effect of profitability on leverage ratios. The effect of growth opportunity on leverage ratios is significantly positive and tangibility has a significant negative effect on short-term debt and total debt ratios but for long-term debt ratio the effect is positive. The effect of firm size on leverage ratios is not significant. The results also indicate that the government ownership has a significant effect on the relationship between firms’ characteristics and capital structure and the pecking order theory is strongly supported and is pertinent theory to the capital structure of Iranian companies.

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