<b>Tobin's q and traditional financial indicators in iron and steel Companies present at bovespa and nyse stock markets</b> - doi: 10.4025/enfoque.v28i3.9516

Abstract

Studies on levels of investment and performance of the iron and steel sector basically use indicators of the financial statements, such as Profit Margins, Return on Assets, Return on Equity and Payout Ratio. The use of investment evaluation models that employ financial measures based on the market, such as Tobin's q, is still largely unexplored in the domestic literature. Therefore this study aims to compare the performance of iron and steel companies with shares traded at BOVESPA and NYSE from 1997 to 2005, through financial measures used and Tobin's q. Tobin's q calculated for companies with shares traded at BOVESPA revealed to be increasing over the selected period. Regarding Tobin’s q for companies with shares traded at NYSE, it was verified that such indicator was less than 1 thus pointing to a disincentive to new investment. Correlation analysis showed low overall correlation between Tobin's q and the traditional financial indicators. One concludes that the indicator captures some information as are not measured by the traditional financial indicators, enhancing their potential for financial analysis of companies and sectorial studies.