Research On The Influence Of Asset Specificity On Capital Structure Of High-tech Enterprises

Financing activities is one of important financial management activities in the enterprises,and financing decisions would have a significant impact on companies, especially the choice ofcapital structure. With the implementation of the strategy of developing China’s innovationdrive, science and technology as "the first productive force" promotes the continuingdevelopment of China’s high-tech industries, and capital structure selection problem ofhigh-tech industries has caused much attention. Characterized by high innovative, high-techenterprises will increase investment in specific assets for competitive advantages. This paperwill make a research on the influence of asset specificity on capital structure.Firstly, this article defines concepts of asset specificity and capital structure, reviews andsorts related literature, bases on Williamson’s transaction cost economics of capital structuretheory, puts forward internal relation of capital structure and asset specificity. Secondly, with thedata of high-tech listed companies in our country, this paper describes current situation of assetspecificity and capital structure of high-tech industries, and analyzes the relationship betweenthem. Thirdly, with the data of144high-tech listed companies in our country, a total of432samples, this paper make the empirical analysis of the relationship between asset specificity andcapital structure. In the empirical process, this article puts forward assumption that assetspecificity is negatively related to capital structure, capital structure’s alternative variables istotal debt ratio and long-term asset-liability ratio, asset specificity’s alternative variable is thecomprehensive index produced by factor analysis method. The empirical analysis results showsthat asset specificity and capital structure of high-tech listed companies in China hassignificantly negative correlation. Finally, according to the results of the empirical analysis, thispaper puts forward some suggestions on how to choose the best capital structure, in order toimprove the efficiency of capital and promote the development of high-tech industries.This article has two innovations: firstly the article based on2009-2011high-techcompanies listed on Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets as the research object, using thehigher asset specificity typical industry data for empirical analysis, the conclusion is morereliability and pertinence. Secondly, one indicator is used as the asset specificity of variable inthe existing literature, this article selects the fixed assets, intangible assets, the proportion ofr&d, advertising costs proportion, as the asset specificity of variables, using the factor analysismethod to get the composite scores as a comprehensive index of asset specificity.