Capital Structure of Malaysian Companies: Are They Different during the COVID-19 Pandemic?

This study examined the level of capital structure and its determinants of publicly traded companies in Malaysia before and after the COVID-19 pandemic. The data for this study was examined using Python Programming Language and time-series financial data from 2,784 quarterly observations in 2019 and 2020. The maximum debt is larger before the COVID-19 period, according to the findings. During the COVID-19 period, short-term debts and total debts have both decreased slightly. However, long-term debts have increased marginally. As a result, this research demonstrates that the capital structure has changed slightly during the COVID-19 period. The findings imply that independent of the capital structure proxies, tangibility, liquidity, and business size had an impact on capital structure in both periods. It was found that profitability had a significant impact on total debts both before and after the COVID-19 crisis. While higher-profit enterprises appear to have lesser short-term debts before the COVID-19 periods, they are also more likely to have lower long-term debts during the COVID-19 periods. Even though growing companies tend to have higher short-term debts and thus total debts during those periods, longterm debts are unaffected by potential growth.