SMEs capital structure: trade-off or pecking order theory: a systematic review

LISANA B. MARTINEZ; SCHERGER, VALERIA; GUERCIO, M. BELÉN

Journal of Small Business and Enterprise Development. Small Business and Enterprise Development

EMERALD PUBLISHING

Lugar: Melbourne; Año: 2018 vol. 26 p. 105 - 132

1462-6004

Purpose ? The purpose of this paper is to organize and present the literature related to firm?s capitalstructure across the years and find the most relevant publications and authors in the research area. Moreover,the authors pretend to fill the gap in the literature by studying different works and their compatibility withthe main theories.Design/methodology/approach ? The systematic literature review is conducted by using the Scopusdatabase. The methodology applied is through a concise searching considering keywords, the most cited papers,the latest publications and theories that explain small and medium enterprises (SMEs) capital structure.Findings ? Some key aspects about the capital structure of firms and SMEs are identified, such asdocuments per year, type of publications, the most used languages, the top journals, the most cited papers, themost productive and influential authors and the latest published papers.Research limitations/implications ? The information presented is only informative from the Scopusdatabase. Hence, this work only gives a general orientation of the most relevant research and its tendencyof this database. More exhaustive works could be done using different keywords and analyzing otherfirms? characteristics.Practical implications ? This kind of study is effective in evaluating the scientific production and tofind the most important contributions of the subject. Furthermore, this information is useful forresearchers? studies on SME capital structure to underline the research direction and to be acquainted withthe literature tendency.Originality/value ? There are not similar works that delve into the literature respect to SME capitalstructure and compare the main theories in relation to empirical works. Therefore, a synthesized evolution ofprevious works related to the capital structure of firms and SMEs is presented.Keywords Capital structure, SMEs, Systematic literature review, Financing, Pecking order theory,Trade-off theoryPaper type Research paper