Production Flexibility, Product Markets, and Capital Structure Decisions
利用全球能源企业的发电厂数据，研究发现生产灵活性越高，企业财务杠杆越大，主要通过降低财务困境预期成本和增加税盾现值实现，且盈利能力影响两种渠道的相对重要性。
We examine how production flexibility affects financial leverage. A worldwide sample of energy utilities allows us to apply direct measures for production flexibility based on their power plants. We find that production flexibility increases financial leverage. For identification, we exploit privatizations and deregulations of electricity markets, geographical variations in natural resources, the technological evolution of gas-fired power plants, and differences in electricity prices and recapitalization cost across regions. Production flexibility affects financial leverage via the channels of reduced expected cost of financial distress and higher present value of tax shields. The relative importance of these channels depends on firms' profitability. Received June 17, 2014; accepted November 9, 2015 by Editor David Denis.