| Contents List | 3 |
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| Abbreviations | 5 |
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| 1 Introduction | 7 |
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| 1.1 General Definition and Justification of Issues and Objectives | 7 |
| 1.2 Research Questions and Methodology | 9 |
| 1.3 Overview and Organisation of Chapters | 10 |
| 2 Existing Theories and their Predictions | 13 |
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| 2.1 Existing Theories | 13 |
| 2.1.1 The Trade-Off Theory | 16 |
| 2.1.2 The Pecking Order Theory | 19 |
| 2.2 Predictions of Existing Theories | 22 |
| 2.2.1 Capital Structure and Industry | 22 |
| 2.2.2 Capital Structure and Profitability | 26 |
| 2.2.3 Capital Structure and Liquidity | 28 |
| 2.2.4 Capital Structure, R | 28 |
| 29 | 28 |
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| 2.2.5 Capital Structure and Dividend Policy | 32 |
| 2.3 A Final Comment | 34 |
| 3 Methodology | 35 |
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| 3.1 Data Sampling | 35 |
| 3.2 Data Collection | 36 |
| 3.2.1 Missing Values and Adjustments | 37 |
| 3.3 Variables and their Definitions | 38 |
| 3.3.1 Leverage and Gearing | 38 |
| 3.3.2 Profits and Return | 40 |
| 3.4 Hypotheses and Hypotheses Testing | 40 |
| 3.4.1 H1: Capital Structure and Industry | 41 |
| 3.4.2 H2: Capital Structure and Profitability | 42 |
| 3.4.3 H3, H4 and H5: Capital Structure, Liquidity, R | 42 |
| 43 | 42 |
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| 4 Findings and Analysis | 45 |
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| 4.1 H1: The Impact of Industry on Capital Structure and Associated Variables | 45 |
| 4.2 H2: The Existence of a Correlation Between Leverage and ROCE | 55 |
| 4.3 H3: The Existence of a Correlation Between Leverage and Liquidity | 60 |
| 4.4 H4: The Existence of a Correlation Between Leverage and R | 60 |
| 63 | 60 |
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| 4.5 H5: The Existence of a Correlation Between Leverage and Dividends | 67 |
| 5 Conclusions | 72 |
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| 5.1 Capital Structure | 72 |
| 5.2 Profitability | 73 |
| 5.3 Liquidity | 74 |
| 5.4 Investments | 74 |
| 5.5 Dividends | 75 |
| 6 Recommendations | 77 |
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| 7 Reflections | 81 |
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| 7.1 Objectives | 81 |
| 7.2 Strengths | 81 |
| 7.3 Weaknesses and Limitations | 82 |
| Bibliography | 84 |
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| Appendix | 91 |
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| Autorenprofil | 125 |