**5. Concluding Remarks**

The purpose of this paper was to investigate the main factors which have an influence on financial structure at the enterprise level, using a sample of 51 American companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange. The relationships that were analyzed between debt and the most important factors, promoted by the traditional theories of capital structure, are similar to those which were observed and analyzed in other research papers from previous years. The dependent variables chosen, namely the total indebtedness rate, the long-term indebtedness rate and the short-term indebtedness rate were chosen because they are factors that influence more or less each of the three. The factors were grouped into three categories, company specific factors, macroeconomic factors and corporate governance factors. These factors have an impact that can be more or less significant. It was demonstrated once

again that factors such as tangibility, growth, size, liquidity etc. have an important influence on the financial structure. In conclusion, the results of the analysis show that the principles of the pecking order theory apply in this case, because the tendency of firms is to be financed internally rather than externally. External finance is also a possibility, but as soon as the internal funds become available, the companies prefer to use them.

This work is limited because the database consists of 51 companies and for a relatively short period of time. The companies were taken from only one sector of activity and only from one country, and this limits the applicability. Future research that includes more countries and a larger sample of companies would better explain the determinants, as, as we have seen, there are also country-specific factors that influence decisions in choosing the optimal financial structure.

**Author Contributions:** Conceptualization, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Data curation, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Formal analysis, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Funding acquisition, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Investigation, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Methodology, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Project administration, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Resources, G.V., S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Software, G.V., ¸ ¸ S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Supervision, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Validation, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Visualization, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Writing—original draft, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.; Writing—review & editing, G.V., ¸S.C.G. and D.A.T.

**Funding:** This research received no external funding.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.

#### **References**


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