Kapitalstrukturens effekt på lönsamhet : En studie av svenska företag

Sammanfattning: In this paper the effect of capital structure on profitability has been investigated among Swedish companies. The essay intends to examine how the relationship between debt and profitability appear among Swedish companies and if the relationship differs between industries. The purpose is to find out how debt affects the profitability of Swedish companies. A quantitative approach has been applied. The selection was made among companies listed on Nasdaq OMX Stockholm, which resulted in a sample of 207 companies. Several regression analyzes has been formed, based on the independent variable debt-ratio and the dependent variables profit margin, pre-tax profit margin, operating margin, return on assets and return on equity. The variables were calculated using data from each company’s annual reports for the entire investigation period, year 2009-2013. The theories in the study are the capital structure irrelevance theory, trade-off, agency theory and the pecking-order theory. The scientific papers which has served as reference for this paper is a study made by Addae et al., where the relationship between debt and profitability were examined among listed companies in Ghana and a study made by Panno, where a similar relationship were examined among companies in the UK and Italy. The results indicates positive relationships between debt-ratio and profit margin, pre-tax profit margin and operating margin. This result is in parity with that from Pannos investigation and it seems that Swedish companies tend to take advantage of the tax-shield, giving support for the trade-off theory. However, regarding the relationship between debt-ratio and return on assets as well as equity, no significant relationship could be found. This means that it is not possible to say that more debt causes changes in return on assets or return on equity among Swedish companies. Furthermore, regarding the relationships between industries, it has only been possible to find significant relationships in 2 out of 17 industries and therefore no valid conclusions could be drawn concerning that question.