Merton-type default risk and financial performance: the dynamic panel moderation of firm size

PurposeThe main purpose of this study is to evaluate the probability of default and examine the relationship between default risk and financial performance, with dynamic panel moderation of firm size.Design/methodology/approachThis study utilizes a total of 1,500 firm-year observations from 2013 to 2018 using dynamic panel data approach of generalized method of moments to test the relationship between default risk and financial performance with the moderation effect of the firm size.FindingsThis study establishes the findings that default risk significantly impacts the financial performance. The relationship between distance-to-default (DD) and financial performance is positive, which means the relationship of the independent and dependent variable is inverse. Moreover, this study finds that the firm size is a significant positive moderator between DD and financial performance.Practical implicationsThis study provides new and useful insight into the literature on the relationship between default risk and financial performance. The results of this study provide investors and businesses related to nonfinancial firms in the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) with significant default risk's impact on performance. This study finds, on average, the default probability in KSE ALL indexed companies is 6.12%.Originality/valueThe evidence of the default risk and financial performance on samples of nonfinancial firms has been minimal; mainly, it has been limited to the banking sector. Moreover, the existing studies have only catered the direct effect of only. This study fills that gap and evaluates this relationship in nonfinancial firms. This study also helps in the evaluation of Merton model's performance in the nonfinancial firms.

Can market state and market volatility explain time-varying momentum profits in South Africa?

PurposeWhile the momentum anomaly is prevalent in South Africa, few have examined the reasons influencing it. This study examines whether momentum profits vary through time and are affected by the state of the market and market volatility between 1998 and 2019.Design/methodology/approachThe authors consider combinations of portfolio construction, such as the lookback period, weighting scheme, measure of volatility and the volatility window period. They further examine the interaction of momentum with sentiment, default risk and semi-deviation as a measure of risk, as a means of testing whether behavioural factors have significant influence.FindingsThe results generally show that neither volatility nor market state has explanatory power on momentum profits.Originality/valueThese results make the momentum anomaly in South Africa an even greater mystery than before as they do not conform to the existing literature from developed economies. The authors do, however, find that default risk is a significant predictor of momentum profits, which is a useful additional factor for those fund managers who utilise momentum strategies. This implies that a fundamental factor, default risk, is a potential explanation for the market-related momentum anomaly.

Impact of Executive Remuneration and Firm Leverage on Firm Stability: Lessons from European Firms

The aim of this study is to examine the impact of executive remuneration and firms’ leverage on firms’ stability as measured by winsorized Zscore (wZscore). The wZscore measure corresponds to the Altman Zscore, which increases as default risk decreases. To test the study’s hypotheses, a linear regression model is applied to a 6-year panel dataset of 180 listed firms categorized in 10 economic sectors operating in 22 countries from the years 2013 to 2018. The results show that executive remuneration has a significant negative impact on firm stability as measured by wZscore. Additionally, firm leverage has a significant positive impact on firm stability. Beyond the theoretical implications, the findings of this study have some practical implications that are particularly relevant to boards of directors, shareholders, managers, and policymakers. The findings suggest that executives should be offered a proper remuneration package to maintain their firms’ stability along with the capacity of firms’ equity and assets to cope up with unprecedented circumstances and the firms’ long-term debts. Finally, this study offers specific recommendations for how firms can balance their pay and performance in terms of executive remuneration and ensure better leverage to optimize their own and society's sustainable development.

International Effect on Family SME Financial Distress Prediction

Understanding the reasons of default risk is crucial to avoid the firm's bankruptcy. The purpose of this work is to analyze the impact of internationalization on firm's probability of distress. For it, this chapter aims to propose a model to predict default specific to family SMEs (small and medium enterprises). An unbalanced panel of 10,832 firms over the period from 2012-2018 is analyzed. Ex-ante criteria to classify firms in default or compliant is used. International SMEs have lower probability of default than domestic firms, and compliant firms export more. Results show that export ratio is an important determinant of the probability of default. Moreover, the ratios of liquidity, profitability, size, leverage, efficiency, cash flow, and age are also relevant. Moreover, these ratios explain default risk of both groups international and domestic SMEs. The proposed model has an accuracy of 92.9%, which increases to 95.6% if only export SMEs are analyzed.

Emerging Markets Interest Rates, International Reserves and Net Foreign Assets

In the context of a managed float regime, we adopt the portfolio balance view to show the effects of the net foreign assets of an economy and its gross international reserves level on interest rate differentials. We argue that the interest rate differential can be explained by three components, where the components are the expected depreciation of the domestic currency, a default risk premium, and a portfolio balance premium. Our theoretical analysis suggests that the interest differential is a convex function of the level of gross international reserves. In particular, the differential and gross reserves are inversely related at low levels of reserves, but positively at higher levels. We evaluate our framework for the case of Lebanon. We find that the differential is inversely related to both net foreign assets and gross international reserves. These findings are then confirmed with data from Indonesia and Mexico.

Evaluating borrowers’ default risk with a spatial probit model reflecting the distance in their relational network

Potential relationship among loan applicants can provide valuable information for evaluating default risk. However, most of the existing credit scoring models either ignore this relationship or consider a simple connection information. This study assesses the applicants’ relation in terms of their distance estimated based on their characteristics. This information is then utilized in a proposed spatial probit model to reflect the different degree of borrowers’ relation on the default prediction of loan applicant. We apply this method to peer-to-peer Lending Club Loan data. Empirical results show that the consideration of information on the spatial autocorrelation among loan applicants can provide high predictive power for defaults.

Consumers’ Perception of The Cost of Credit Default in The Vehicle Finance Industry in South Africa

The risk that a borrower may not fulfil his/her borrowing obligation presents credit owner (lender) a default risk management opportunity to maximize the risk-adjusted rate of return and to maintain minimum exposure to default associated cost. This paper investigated respondents’ perception of the cost of credit default and examines requirements for default risk management (DRM) in the vehicle finance industry in South Africa. It is noted that with an increased level of consumer indebtedness, unstable economy, high unemployment, opportunistic risks like health pandemics, vehicle financing faces a higher probability of default from borrowers. This descriptive investigation utilised quantitative approach using a survey method to collect data from 381 purposive randomly selected respondents who are vehicle finance customers in South Africa, Cape Town specifically. Data collection took place in the Western Cape over a nine-month period, utilising personal interview, and emails to administer questionnaires to vehicle finances’ customers as data collection instruments. Responses received were codified and quantitative data were analysed using the Statistical Packages for Social Sciences (SPSS version 25) The paper found mixed and variable respondents’ perception of the cost of credit default. In conclusion, it is perceived that South Africa debt would become more costly with credit default. It can be recommended that a default risk management intervention be applied to manage credit default risk within the context of the unified credit assessment policy in South Africa.