EFFECT OF OWNERSHIP STRUCTURE ON CAPITAL STRUCTURE OF LITHUANIAN LISTED COMPANIES
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15544/ssaf.2021.03Abstract
The aim of this study is to investigate the impact of ownership structure on the capital structure of Lithuanian listed companies.
A ten-year period from 2009 to 2018 has been selected for this study. The study includes non-financial companies listed on the Nasdaq Vilnius Stock Exchange. The ownership structure was assessed according to the concentration of ownership and according to the identity of the owner. In the first part of the study, a comparative analysis of the capital structure of companies with different ownership structures was performed. In the second stage of the study, a regression analysis was performed to determine the impact of the ownership structure on capital structure of listed companies.
The research showed significant differences in the capital structure of Lithuanian listed companies in different groups of ownership concentrations and different trends in capital structure in individual groups of companies: medium-sized companies try to use less financial debt and also to reduce the share of borrowed capital in the capital structure, and small and large ownership concentration companies tend to borrow more. Summarizing the results of the comparative analysis, it is assumed that the dependence of the level of indebtedness of Lithuanian listed companies on the ownership concentration is in the form of U (parabola), i. e., when the ownership concentration in companies is low (less than 25%) or high (more than 50%), companies tend to use more borrowed funds, and in the case of medium ownership concentration (when the first largest shareholder holds between 25% and 50% of shares) , efforts are being made to reduce the level of indebtedness as well as the level of financial debt. The results of the regression analysis refuted this assumption and led to the conclusion that there is a statistically significant negative linear relationship between ownership concentration and companies indebtedness, i. e. the increasing concentration of equity in Lithuanian listed companies has a statistically significant negative impact on both the total share of borrowed capital in the capital structure and the share of financial debt in the capital structure. Nevertheless, the results of the regression analysis didn’t show a statistically significant influence of the ownership identity on the level of indebtedness of Lithuanian listed companies, as well as on the level of financial indebtedness.
Keywords: ownership structure, capital structure, ownership concentration, ownership identity, leverage ratio.
JEL codes: G32.
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