기업의 현금자산 증가와 연구개발 투자

It is difficult to raise capital and involved with high information costs when firms invest in R&D because it is intangible and unclear whether it will generate profits. There is an incentive for companies to use cash as internal capital for R&D investments so that timely investment can be made. This study examines whether corporate R&D investment explains the trend of changes in cash assets. To this end, we use the sample of non-financial companies that have been listed from 2000 to 2021. Unlike previous studies, the variable to measure R&D investments is constructed using the perpetual inventory method that stockpile part of R&D expenditure by amortizing it every year. Cash assets in financial statements are the result of accumulating past decisions to hoard cash, so it is appropriate to set the R&D investment variable as accumulated value of past decisions consistently. We find that the level of cash assets of firms increases during the sample period. And R&D investment explains the increasing trend of cash assets significantly, consistent with our hypothesis. We also find that the coefficient of R&D investment on cash assets continues to increase year by year. The result means that the increase in cash is explained by both an absolute increase in the level of R&D expenditure and an increase in the sensitivity of cash assets to R&D investment. Furthermore, we find that the stronger the competition in the industry, the stronger the explanatory power of R&D investment in cash assets. It suggests that firms in the industry with greater competition have incentive to pile cash more strongly since efficient R&D investment is more critical to be stay competitive.