Entry-Deterring Debt
论证债务本身能提升企业竞争地位，但可能以牺牲消费者和对手为代价；杠杆收购的盈利增加可能源于债务带来的侵略性而非效率提升，并说明债务可被用于反竞争地阻止新企业进入。
RECENT STUDIES, including Kaplan (1988) and Jarrell, Brickley, and Netter (1988), have provided striking evidence that leveraged buyouts and corporate takeovers result in increased profitability. In this paper we demonstrate that leverage itself can improve the competitive position of firms at the expense of consumers and business rivals, and that leveraged aggressiveness, rather than increased efficiency, may be responsible for the increased profitability of buyouts. It is now well accepted that an incumbent can deter a rival's entry only through credible threats, that is, actions which maximize the incumbent's profits once entry has occurred. Only by changing its payoffs in a way which effectively commits it to being an aggressive rival can an incumbent deter otherwise profitable entry. Brander and Lewis (1986) showed that in an oligopoly increased debt is procompetitive, in the sense that debt makes firms more aggressive, when the firms enjoy limited liability. 1 In this paper it is shown that increased debt can serve the anticompetitive purpose of deterring entry. This is an example of the general principle that a device that commits the firm to act procompetitively (that is, more aggressively) toward its rivals can be used anti-