Robert Stretcher

Capital structure: professional management guidance

Purpose - Capital structure decisions rely on a complex array of theoretical foundations and practical considerations. At the managerial level, it is impractical to base decisions purely on theory. While one can develop a perception of an optimal capital structure, the decision is often obscured by practical limitations to the theoretical base. In order to be useful to practicing managers, policies and decision techniques need to be efficiently accomplished and based on available information. This paper seeks to provide that practical framework. Design/methodology/approach - This paper recounts the simple theoretical base for capital structure, highlights some of the problems encountered when applying the theory to reality, and suggests a framework for practical managerial decisions about capital structure. This exposition is especially useful in undergraduate business curricula, in particular for finance majors considering professional management as a career. Findings - While application of traditional capital structure theory is often impractical, numerous tools are available for use by professional managers to make informed decisions about capital structure. Practical implications - The conclusions from this paper provide a framework for current and prospective professional managers for making appropriate capital structure decisions in their management careers. Social implications - Proper managerial techniques and considerations for leverage and capital structure can potentially benefit society through more prudent use of debt, based on the variety of measures presented in this paper. Originality/value - Topics discussed in this paper have been in development since the 1950s. The contribution of this paper is the creation of a framework for understanding and applying these topics, for pedagogical and management training purposes.

Business Schools' Policies Regarding Publications in Electronic Journals.

Perhaps the most obvious example of innovation in faculty performance is the adoption of new technologies for research. Both administrators and faculty have expressed concern about the role that electronic publications play in their research evaluation processes, particularly in business schools, where scholarly publication is often emphasized over other activities. Yet, there appears to be no empirical evidence for the way that electronic journals are evaluated compared to printed paper versions. Therefore, in this study, the authors sought to determine how business school deans regard the formats in which their faculty is publishing.

Short-Selling Constraints: The Asymmetric Role of Institutional Ownership, Relative Short Interest, Options and Dividends

We assess the effect of four short-sale constraints on stock returns in isolation and in combination, in generally falling versus generally rising markets, and considering relative effects for large/mid-cap versus small/micro-cap firms. There is substantial evidence that our more fully specified model provides considerable additional explanatory power with less factor omission bias than prior studies. We also find that the constraint behavior is asymmetric when testing during generally falling versus generally rising markets, and that small- and micro-cap firms provide important effects when viewed separately. Our results provide substantive pricing differences between least versus most short-sale constrained stocks.