신용등급과 이익조정이 자본구조결정에 미치는 영향에 대한 연구

This paper examines what factors affect capital structure decisions by looking into all companies that had their senior debentures rated by at least one of the three credit rating agencies in Korea during the period from 1994 through 2005. It first studies the effects of credit ratings on capital structure under the Credit Rating Capital Structure Hypothesis (CS-CR) introduced by Kisgen in 2006. The study finds that a meaningful relationship between the credit rating and capital structure also holds in Korea. Then it analyzes the influence of earnings management on capital structure. The analysis reveals not just that earnings management plays a material role in debt and equity financing decisions, but also that the credit rating factors that have been identified as affecting capital structure under the CR-CS hypothesis are actually irrelevant. This suggests that the differences in capital structure under Kisgen's hypothesis have been largely caused by earnings management. The paper also examines and compares two different periods, before and after the financial crisis in Korea, and two rating categories, investment and speculative grades. The results of this comparison are consistent with the above analysis, which demonstrates that the estimated coefficient for the effects of earnings management is a very significant factor. As a results, most of the changes in capital structure of speculative-grade companies after the financial crisis, in particular, turn out to be attributable to earnings management.