Target adjustment model and new working capital management performance measure: Evidence from Croatia

The paper develops a dynamic panel model of target adjustment in order to investigate the determinants of the cash conversion cycle of companies in manufacturing, trade, and information and communication industries in the Republic of Croatia for the period 2008-2015. The emphasis is on examining the significances and the speeds of the adjustment processes of the cash conversion cycles of companies subsamples by industry and size. Due to the adjustment costs, the results show that the observed companies gradually adjust their current cash conversion cycles to the target ones. In addition, these adjustments were slow, which can be explained by the predominance of the adjustment costs over the costs of being in disequilibrium. Moreover, the results of this study indicate that the rate of adjustment varies among companies from different industries and size categories. The differences in market power allow companies to change more easily the components of the cash conversion cycle. As a result, they enable faster convergence to their target levels. Besides the lagged cash conversion cycle, tested potential determinants that significantly affect the cash conversion cycles of Croatian companies in selected industries, although with different robustness, are company size, company growth, return on assets, fixed asset investments, financial leverage and the growth of the real gross domestic product. Finally, the paper presents a new measure for working capital management performance