Читать книгу Equity Markets, Valuation, and Analysis - H. Kent Baker - Страница 54

Up to this point, the chapter focuses on an equity investment from the investor's perspective. However, examining the implications of choosing stock (equity) financing or debt (bond) financing from a firm's perspective is also important. Stocks and bonds represent two distinct financing choices for firms.

When a firm sells equity to investors, it sells a firm's ownership and control, providing stockholders with ownership or an ownership claim on both the firm's assets and earnings. As owners, common stockholders have a right to some control over the organization as provided via their right to vote on important issues. Shareholders receive residual claims of assets and earnings after other stakeholders are paid.

Alternatively, debt interest and principal payments are legal obligations. If a firm fails to pay periodic interest or principal, it is technically in default of a contractual obligation and faces the possibility of bankruptcy or reorganization, a process in which the firm's ownership may be transferred from shareholders to debtholders by a court order.