The Effect of Operation Diversity of Business Groups and The Kind of Industry on Intra-group Debts

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of operation diversity of business groups and kind of industry on the intragroup debts. A firm is a member of business group if it has a subsidiary firm or is a subsidiary of another firm. The study sample consists of 91 firms listed in Tehran Stock Exchange during the 2001 to 2010. All of the firms are a member of a business group. The index of sample firms'' intra-group debts has been calculated by dividing intra-group debts by the sum of debts. In order to test the research hypotheses، T-test and ANOVA test have been used. The results indicate that member firms of diverse business groups have higher intra-group debts than member firms of non diverse business groups. In other word، the intra-group financial relations of the member firms of diverse business groups are higher than member firms of non diverse business groups. Also، the results show that the type of industry affects the intra-group debts.