This empirical investigation attempts to enquire into the relationship among debt financing, agency cost and performance of Indian manufacturing firms. The study tries to document the impact of debt financing on firm performance in two different phases of panel data estimations. In the first phase, the study enquires the effect of debt on firms’ profitability measured by ‘return on equity’. The second phase tries to empirically explain the reason behind such impact by introducing agency cost. Considering the manufacturing firms traded in the BSE 200 Index from 2009–2016, the study documents a significant and negative effect of debt on firm performance. The magnitude of debt is also found to be positively affecting the agency cost measured by ‘general and administrative expenses’. So the negative effect of debt on firm performance is reinforced and justified as debt is also found to elevate the agency costs for the firms.
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