The proposed method consists of modeling the time-series of the financial ratios, by
testing whether the event of the change in accounting standards causes structural breaks in the
random walk of the debt ratios; this test (CHOW, 1960) compares the forecasted series with
the actual observed series from the defined event. In order to model the time-series, we also
include macroeconomic variables, accepting the fact that the economic and financial situation
of the company can be effectively changed, and not its accounting expression. That is,
macroeconomic changes may have affected the businesses of firms; thus, we attempt to
control this effect with the use of macroeconomic variables.