Thesis (M.Phil.)--Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 36-38).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2004. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 99-104).

A Research Report submitted to the Facultv of Commerce, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Commerce. / This Research Report examines the determinants of South African industrial firms' capital structures. The report attempts to evaluate if a firm's preference for equity or debt capital can be attributed to specific variables which may reflect its industry profile or operating structure. A literature review, discussing both perfect and imperfect capital market conditions, is included in order to determine if the premise of "variable influence" has academic support. The variables found to have an influence on (non South African company) capital structure by authors examined in the review, are / Andrew Chakane 2018

<p>During the past year it has been made possible to buy back a company’s outstanding stock. This is done in order to change the capital structure towards a situation with less equity. A change in capital structure means a change in the cost of capital for a company and by that a change in the value for the stockholder. This Master Thesis studies the relation between capital structure and business risk. Studying the debt to equity ratio in a company captures capital structure. Studying the volatility in return on assets over a certain time period captures business risk. The Master Thesis also includes a study of what factors have an impact on the business risk when looking at the day-to-day business. By conducting a study of the pulp and paper industry and its nine listed companies a picture is created of what factors have an impact on the relation between capital structure and business risk. The business risk is in a very high degree dependant on factors like economic development for the product, raw material prices, number of product groups and what segments the company penetrates. A positive relation between capital structure and business risk has been identified. The study also indicates that other factors than just the business risk should be hold responsible for a company’s capital structure.</p>

During the past year it has been made possible to buy back a company’s outstanding stock. This is done in order to change the capital structure towards a situation with less equity. A change in capital structure means a change in the cost of capital for a company and by that a change in the value for the stockholder. This Master Thesis studies the relation between capital structure and business risk. Studying the debt to equity ratio in a company captures capital structure. Studying the volatility in return on assets over a certain time period captures business risk. The Master Thesis also includes a study of what factors have an impact on the business risk when looking at the day-to-day business. By conducting a study of the pulp and paper industry and its nine listed companies a picture is created of what factors have an impact on the relation between capital structure and business risk. The business risk is in a very high degree dependant on factors like economic development for the product, raw material prices, number of product groups and what segments the company penetrates. A positive relation between capital structure and business risk has been identified. The study also indicates that other factors than just the business risk should be hold responsible for a company’s capital structure.

This paper has studied the relationship between free cash flow &amp; debt with profitability of the Nordic Nasdaq large cap for the period of 2012-1017. Population of the study consists of 223 Nordic companies listed in Nasdaq. From this population a sample of 100 companies from different sectors have been chosen by random sampling, but the sample does not include financial institutions because the way these kinds of institutions are financing differ from companies in other sectors. Data has been collected from Eikon program which provides financial information about the listed companies around the world based on the company's audited financial statements. validity and reliability of the data have been checked to make sure the data are not wrong. In this study, free cash flow, debt to equity ratio &amp; debt ratio are considered as independent variables and profitability of the firm has been considered as dependent variable. In addition, diversity of the companies based on the countries they are established in is considered as dummy variable. Profitability of the firms have been measured by return on asset. The research philosophy is positivism and the research approach is deductive. Based on a quantitative research in which secondary data has been analyzed by running the Pearson correlation analysis and regression analysis. Result of the study revealed that; free cash flow has a positive effect on profitability of the Nordic Nasdaq large cap. In addition, the result of study showed that; debt ratio has negative effect on profitability of the targeted firms. But, the result showed that; the debt to equity ratio does not affect profitability of the firms. The result of running dummy variable revealed that; companies in Finland have 2,3 % lower return on assets compared with the companies located in Denmark. Also, the companies established in Sweden have a 2,3 % lower return on assets compared with Denmark.

When society, and especially the financial markets, experience a downturn real estate companies are often front and center of discussions. This sector is a capital-intensive industry which often carries a large fraction of borrowed funds. The last decade has been marked by good economic growth, low interest rates, and rising property values which the real estate market has profited from. Public real estate companies appraise investment properties exclusively on fair value, which means that estimated market values influence companies’ financial reports. The study aims to scrutinize how property values impact debt, and further shed light on the pro-cyclical nature of property values. Using a deductive approach, fair value changes of real estate in relation to debt are analyzed through a correlation analysis and multiple regression. The study applies two dependent variables where debt-equity ratio constitutes one of them, and interest-bearing debt in relation to net operating income constitutes the other. The result shows that fair value changes have a significant weak negative correlation to the debt-equity ratio, and a non-significant weak positive correlation to interest-bearing debt to net operating income. The authors conclude that the weak correlation found in debt-equity ratio implies that real estate companies react to fair value changes. The non-significant correlation with interest-bearing debt in relation to net operating income indicates that fair value changes increase companies’ debt. Furthermore, the study shows that there are individual differences between companies. / När samhället, och i synnerhet de finansiella marknaderna, upplever försämrade tider är ofta fastighetsbolag på tapeten. Sektorn är en kapitalintensiv bransch som ofta förfogar över en stor del lånade medel. Det senaste årtiondet har präglats av god ekonomisk tillväxt, låga räntor och stigande fastighetsvärden vilket har gynnat fastighetsbranschen. Börsnoterade fastighetsbolag värderar förvaltningsfastigheter uteslutande till verkligt värde, vilket innebär att uppskattade marknadsvärden ger effekt på bolagens finansiella rapporter. Studien ämnar särgranska huruvida fastighetsvärdet inverkar på skuldsättning och vidare belysa fastighetsvärdens procykliska natur. Ur en deduktiv ansats analyseras orealiserade värdeförändringar på fastigheter i relation till skuldsättning genom en korrelationsanalys och en multipel regression. Studien tillämpar två beroende variabler där skuldsättningsgrad utgör den ena och räntebärande skulder i förhållande till driftnetto utgör den andra. Resultatet visar att orealiserade värdeförändringar har ett statistiskt signifikant svagt negativt samband med skuldsättningsgrad och ett icke statistiskt signifikant svagt positivt samband med räntebärande skulder i förhållande till driftnetto. Författarna kommer fram till att det svaga sambandet med skuldsättningsgrad antyder att fastighetsbolag agerar på orealiserade värdeförändringar. Det ickestatistiskt signifikanta positiva sambandet med räntebärande skulder i förhållande till driftnetto indikerar att orealiserade värdeförändringar ökar bolagens skuldsättning. Avslutningsvis visar studiens resultat att det finns individuella skillnader mellan bolagen

There are multiple ways to analyze stock companies. One way is using fundamental analysis, which means one is analyzing the company’s business key figures, such as revenue, net income and more. The key figures that were chosen to be analyzed in this report were: revenue, net income, free cash f low, return on invested capital and debt-to-equity ratio. In this thesis, machine learning was implemented to evaluate if it is possible to automate fundamental research of companies and to be able to produce a portfolio that would outperform the Swedish stock index. The data set used for both training and testing the classifiers contained the company’s basic information, 10 years of fundamental history and stock price history from the past 10 years. The companies examined were every stock listed on Nasdaq Stockholm, Nasdaq First North, Spotlight Market, Nordic Growth Market and PepMarket. The data that was gathered stretches from 2012 to 2021 which were split up into f ive-year periods and made up the training and testing period. The training data contained fundamental history from every company from these five-year periods. The classifier’s results from the testing period were used to create the portfolios during the holding period 2021-2022 to benchmark against the Swedish stock index. The results indicate that it is indeed possible to create portfolios using machine learning that will outperform the market over a year of holding the stocks. / Det finns många olika sätt att analysera aktieföretag. Ett sätt är att använda fundamental analys, vilket innebär att man analyserar företagets nyckeltal, såsom omsättning, årets resultat, etc. Nyckeltalen som har valts att analyseras i denna studie var: omsättning, årets resultat, fritt kassaflöde, avkastning på investerat kapital samt skuldsättningsgrad. I denna avhandling har maskininlärning implementerats för att undersöka om det är möjligt att automatisera fundamental forskning av företag och skapa en portfölj som ger bättre avkastning än svenska aktieindex. Data som används för både träning och testning av klassificerare innehöll företagens grundläggande information, 10 år av fundamental historik samt aktiekurs historik för dem senaste 10 åren. Företagen som undersöktes var varje aktie listad på Nasdaq Stockholm, Nasdaq First North, Spotlight Market, Nordic Growth Market och PepMarket. Data som har samlats sträcker sig från 2012 till 2021 och var uppdelade i femårsperioder till träning och testning. Träningsdata innehöll fundamental historik från varje företag från dessa femårsperioder. Resultaten från klassificerare från testning perioden användes för att skapa portföljer under 20212022 som jämfördes med svenska aktieindex. Resultaten från detta indikerar att det är möjligt att skapa portföljer med hjälp av maskininlärningsmetoder som kan ge bättre avkastning än svenska aktieindex över en innehavsperiod på ett år.

Examensarbete i foretagsekonomi, Ekonomihögskolan vid Linnéuniversitetet, 2FE93E, VT 2017 Författare Johan Asplund, Henrik Norrman och Therese Rodger Handledare Andreas Stephan Titel Hur investmentbolag paverkar kapitalstrukturen i sina innehav - En fallstudie av Ratos Bakgrund Bolags kapitalstruktur, fördelningen mellan bolagets tillgångar och skulder, visar hur bolaget finansierar sin verksamhet. Private Equity bolag lånar kapital för att kunna investera i nya uppköp av onoterade bolag och har ofta en begränsad planerad ägarhorisont. Kapitalstruktur har undersökts under lång tid men inte hur en majoritetsägare påverkar kapitalstrukturen i sina andelsbolag. Tidigare studier fokuserar pa exempelvis kapitalstrukturer i industriföretag eller kapitalstrukturer i småforetag. Syfte Syftet med studien ar att analysera om ett investmentbolag påverkar kapitalstrukturen i sina innehavsbolag nar de genom uppköp har gått in som en majoritetsägare i dessa bolag och vilka effekter förändringen kan leda till. Metod Studien utgår från en kvantitativ ansats där finansiella nyckeltal av Ratos innehavsbolag undersöks före och efter det att Ratos gått in som majoritetsagare i bolaget. Dessa nyckeltal jämförs sedan med branschspecifika nyckeltal genererade från SCB. Resultat I studien återfinns inget entydigt bevis på att vårt valda Private Equity bolag, Ratos, ändrar kapitalstrukturen väsentligt på något sätt efter att ha gått in som majoritetsägare i ett bolag. / A company’s choice of capital structure is a well documented field in financial research but no unambiguous results are available regarding how the company is best financed or what actually defines the optimal capital structure for a company. The purpose of this study is to examine the possible changes on a company’s capital structure once a Private Equity company has become the majority owner. In this study a deductive approach has been used and a quantitative survey has been applied. Financial ratios from yearly reports of companies before and after the Swedish Private Equity company Ratos became the majority owner have been analysed and compared with the hypothesis that a Private Equity majority owner would significantly change the capital structure of the acquired company. The selection criteria for the companies was that Ratos should own more than 50 % of the company in order to actually have an impact on how the company is financed, in addition the selected companies needed to have data available in the form of yearly reports both prior to Ratos becoming the majority owner and at least two years afterwards in order to study the eventual changes of the take over. Financial ratios such as debt to equity ratio, leverage and return on equity were then calculated and results analysed. Theories of capital structure such as the Trade off theory, Pecking order theory, Miller and Modigliani and the Agency theory have also been applied to analyse the outcome. The method of comparison used was the differencein-difference method with data from Statistics Sweden (SCB) from similar relevant companies. The results of this study do not indicate that the capital structure of the company changes significantly within the first two years after acquisition by the majority owner Ratos. Suggestions for further studies would be to analyse a wider group of Private Equity companies as majority owners and observe eventual changes in capital structure in takeovers.

Modebranschen är Sveriges största kreativa näring, den är även Sveriges snabbast växande exportindustri. Trots det, så är modebranschen tillika en av de mest känsliga och utsatta branscherna, som till stor grad påverkas av yttre faktorer. Konsumtionen har under de senaste åren gått neråt och valet rörande hur de svenska modeföretagen väljer att finansiera sig kan minst sagt komma att bli ett betydelsefullt beslut i denna lättpåverkade bransch. Denna studie undersöker om det finns en skillnad i hur kapitalstrukturen hos de svenska börsnoterade modeföretagen ser ut. Samt om denna struktur är beroende av om företagsledningen äger en stor andel aktier i företaget. Studien analyserar vidare om det finns ett samband mellan ägarstyrda företagsledningar och skuldsättningsgraden i företaget. Studien baseras på en kvantitativ studie av de svenska, börsnoterade modeföretagen; Hennes &amp; Mauritz, KappAhl, MQ Holding, Venue Retail Group, RNB Retail and Brands och Odd Molly International. Undersökningen utgår från modeföretagens årsredovisningar, för att på så vis tillhandahålla information gällande företagens finansieringskällor, samt för att kunna utläsa hur många personer av de i företagsledningen som innehar aktier i företaget. Resultatet visar att en majoritet av de svenska börsnoterade modeföretagen har en kapitalstruktur som till större del består av eget kapital, och till mindre del av skulder. En majoritet har vidare en företagsledning där mer än hälften även äger aktier i företaget. / The fashion industry is Sweden's largest creative industry and Sweden's fastest export industry. Nevertheless, the fashion industry is one of the most vulnerable and exposed industries, that are also affected by external factors. The consumption has fallen in recent years, and the choice of how fashion companies are to finance themselves can be a significant decision in this easily affected industry. This study investigates whether there is a difference in the capital structure of listed fashion companies, depending on whether the management holds a large share of equities in the company or not. Furthermore, the study analyses whether there is a correlation between the company's debt-to-equity ratio and the management's ownership. The study is based on a quantitative study, analyzing the Swedish listed companies; Hennes &amp; Mauritz, KappAhl, MQ Holding, Venue Retail Group, RNB Retail and Brands and Odd Molly International, in order to read the link between management and debt-to-equity ratios. The survey is based on the fashion companies' annual reports, to provide information about the sources of funding. As well as to identify how many of the people in the company's board and management that hold shares in the company. The result shows that a majority of the Swedish listed companies holds a capital structure that largely consists of equity, and a small portion of liabilities. A majority also has a management team where more than half of them also own shares in the company.