The Analytics of Investment, q, and Cash Flow / Andrew B. Abel.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Abel, Andrew B.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w21549.

NBER working paper series no. w21549

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2015.

Summary:

In this paper I analyze the relationships among investment, q, and cash flow in a tractable stochastic model in which marginal q and average q are identically equal. After analyzing the impact of changes in the distribution of the marginal operating profit of capital, I extend the model to include measurement error and analyze the cash-flow coefficient in regressions of investment on q and cash flow. In empirical studies, the estimated cash-flow coefficient is generally positive and larger for rapidly growing firms. Such findings are typically interpreted as evidence of financial frictions facing firms. I derive closed-form expressions for the cash-flow coefficient that are positive and larger for faster growing firms, yet there are no financial frictions in the model.

Notes:

Print version record

September 2015.