Do Borrowers Intentionally Avoid Covenant Violations? A Reexamination of the Debt Covenant Hypothesis

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Bordeman, Adam; Demerjian, Peter
• 署名单位: California State University System; California Polytechnic State University San Luis Obispo; University System of Georgia; Georgia State University
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF ACCOUNTING RESEARCH
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0021-8456
• DOI: 10.1111/1475-679X.12456
• 发表日期: 2022
• 页码: 1741-1774
• 关键词: earnings management; loan sales; IMPACT

摘要

In this study, we replicate and extend the Dichev and Skinner [DS: 2002] study on the debt covenant hypothesis (DCH). We start by replicating DS and find results consistent with theirs. We then extend their work by changing three aspects of the research design: histogram bin width, calculation of slack, and statistical test of discontinuity. We find that the inference from DS is generally robust to varying these choices, although sensitive to different bin widths, during their sample period. We extend our analysis to the period 2000-2019 and find that support for DCH remains robust. We do, however, find a lack of support for DCH when examining the most common financial covenant, debt-to-EBITDA. These findings suggest a more nuanced perspective on DCH, whereby different types of financial covenants provide different incentives and abilities to avoid technical default.