Developments in corporate creditworthiness around ownership events

Abstract

Purpose

This study seeks to explore developments in corporate creditworthiness before and after ownership events.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper uses the Blockholders database of Dlugosz, Fahlenbrach, Gompers, and Metrick, and three credit quantities, and deploys a standard event study methodology to examine the relation to corporate creditworthiness.

Findings

The paper discovers that ownership‐construction is generally associated with prior‐ and post‐improvement in creditworthiness, while a block‐destruction is typically surrounded by deterioration in corporate creditworthiness. The paper also finds proper evidence for a relation between the construction or destruction of managerial block and future developments in corporate creditworthiness. The paper further realizes that outside shareholders exhibit higher impact than inside block‐holders on later variations in credit risk.

Research limitations/implications

The paper is unable to conduct further robustness checks with structural credit methodologies due to the reduced number of valid observations.

Originality/value

Market participants can utilize the conclusions to better predict future trends in corporate creditworthiness.

Citation

Parnes, D. (2011), "Developments in corporate creditworthiness around ownership events", International Journal of Managerial Finance, Vol. 7 No. 4, pp. 377-396. https://doi.org/10.1108/17439131111166384