일반적으로 대리인 문제는 주주와 경영자 간의 갈등을 의미하는 경우가 많으나, 대주주와 소액주주 간 갈등 또는 주주와 채권자 간 갈등의 양상으로 나타나기도 한다. 본 연구에서는 레버리지 증가에 따라 발생하는 주주와 채권자 간 갈등이 어떤 상황에서 증가 또는 완화되는지 확인하기 위해 여러 조건에서 레버리지가 기업가치에 미치는 영향에 대한 분석을 실시하였다. 분석결과는 다음과 같다. 위험수준과 성장기회가 높은 조건에서 레버리지 증가는 기업가치에 부정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났으며, 단기 부채 비중과 은행차입비중이 높은 조건에서는 레버리지가 증가할수록 기업가치가 증가하는 것으로 관찰됐다. 한편, 소유집중도가 높은 조건에서는 레버리지가 기업가치에 긍정적인 영향을 미친 반면, 외국인지분율이 높은 조건에서는 레버리지의 증가가 기업가치에 부정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 관찰됐다. 연구 결과는 다음과 같이 해석될 수 있다. 레버리지가 증가함에 따라 주주는 과소투자행태를 보이거나, 위험수준이 매우 높은 투자안을 채택함으로써 채권자의 부를 이전시키는 결과를 초래할 수도 있다. 이러한 비효율적인 투자행태는 결국 기업가치에 부정적인 영향을 미치며, 이는 채권자의 모니터링에 의해 완화될 수 있다. 소유구조와 관련한 분석결과에서는 내부주주인 대주주와 외부주주인 외국인 투자자가 레버리지 증가에 대하여 각각 다른 반응을 보이는 것으로 확인됐다. 전자의 경우 의사결정에 대한 권한이 강화되는 조건에서 주주만의 이익을 추구하기 보다는 기업가치를 제고하는 방향으로 행동하는 것으로 나타났다. 반면, 후자의 경우 영향력이 증가하는 조건에서 전체의 이익보다는 주주만의 이익을 고려하여 기업가치에는 부정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 확인됐다.
The purpose of this study was to identify the patterns of conflict between shareholders and creditors and to identify under what conditions the conflicts between them were alleviated or deepened. First, an analysis was conducted to determine whether conflicts between shareholders and creditors resulting from increased leverage resulted in inefficient investment. As a result, the interaction between leverage and risk level and growth opportunity variables all have negative effects on firm value. This suggests that increased conflicts between shareholders and creditors provide incentives for shareholders to make inefficient decisions that prioritize their own interests. Secondly, an analysis was conducted to determine how conflicts of interest between shareholders and creditors appeared according to the types of debts raised. As a result, it was confirmed that interactions with short-term debt and bank borrowings have a positive effect on firm value. This suggests that the greater the frequency of exposure to creditors’ monitoring and the more creditors with strong corporate intelligence, the less likely to induce conflict between shareholders and creditors. In addition, it can be seen that the role of creditors is important in reducing conflicts between shareholders and creditors. Finally, an analysis was conducted to determine how ownership structure affects the conflict between shareholders and creditors. The results show that the interaction between ownership concentration and leverage has a positive effect on firm value. On the other hand, the interaction between foreign investor’s share and leverage has negatively affected firm value. Taken together, the results can be interpreted as follows. Claims on corporate interests have priority over creditors, while shareholders have claims on residuals after the distribution of profits to creditors. Thus, increased leverage can hamper rational decision-making that increases shareholder value. This has a negative impact on firm value, either by showing passive investment behavior without considering growth opportunities or by providing incentives to choose overly risky investments. To alleviate this unusual behavior of shareholders, it is possible to use short-term debt with early maturity or increase the borrowing ratio of banks with less information asymmetry than other creditors. In other words, if a company with a high incentive to act as a proxy between shareholders and creditors is frequently exposed to monitoring by creditors or credit rating agencies, or is closely monitored by a highly informed creditor, ineffective behavior due to conflicts between shareholders and creditors can be prevented. In this study, major shareholders (internal shareholders) and foreign investors (outer shareholders) responded differently to increased leverage. In the former case, in a situation where the authority to make decisions is strengthened, the former acts to increase firm value rather than seek shareholder interests. On the other hand, the latter case was found to have a negative impact on firm value, considering shareholders" interests rather than overall profits under increasing influence. This may be due to the fact that large shareholders, internal shareholders, are more sensitive than foreign investors, external shareholders, to reduce the value of their holdings due to a decline in firm value. The results of this study are as follows. First, the ineffective investment decision-making behavior of shareholders, who are represented by the agency problem between shareholders and creditors, proves to be in two opposite directions. Second, in identifying the agent problem, it was confirmed that corporate characteristics could affect the agency problem by reflecting the financial characteristics of the company. Third, by reflecting the characteristics of ownership structure, we confirmed that conflicts between shareholders and creditors arising from leverage can be affected by ownership structure.