Jones, Wesley Matthew, Jr.

Contemporary finance theory suggests that the appropriate goal of the management of a corporation should be to maximize the contribution of the shareholder's ownership in the corporation to the shareholder's wealth. A related objective of the firm's management that is consistent with this prime objective should be to minimize the cost of all inputs into the firm's income producing process. This would include minimizing the cost of the capital required to fund the firm's operations. This study examines the cost of debt to firms issuing new debt. Using a sample of new debt issues between 1988 and 1993 drawn from a listing compiled by the Capital Markets Division of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, this study finds that when underwriters are categorized by recent (last year) experience, the issuing firm's choice of an underwriter does not affect the offering yield required of the issuer in excess of several benchmark yields. Excess yield is tested with respect to 3-month treasury bills, 10-year constant maturity treasury securities, the average contemporary yield on AAA rated corporate bonds, and the average contemporary yield on new corporate issues carrying the same rating. The results do suggest that the issuing firm's choice of underwriter does affect the underwriter spread that the issuer will be charged. The implication of the results to corporate issuers of new debt is that choosing an experienced underwriter (defined in the study as having appeared in the listing of the top ten underwriters of corporate debt reported by Wall Street Journal in the previous year) could lead to reduced overall net interest costs stemming from the reduced underwriter spread.