Conclusions
Economics, and in particular, financial economics provide rigorous theoretical tools for valuing
assets The theory is unambiguous in stating that the value of an asset depends on the cash flow
actually received by investors, not on the cash flows that could be received If excess cash is
retained within the firm, it may be invested in zero- or nonzero-NPV activities. If it is invested
in zero-NPV activities and their full present value is distributed to shareholders then the use of potential dividends is equivalent to the use of
actual net payments to shareholders. If it is invested in nonzero-NPV investments, one is bound
to explicitly forecast the payout policy of the firm, to avoid to overstate the firm’s value.
Whatever the assumption, the use of actual payments always leads to the correct value.
If, historically, the firm has not distributed all the available cash or if investment in
liquid assets has not been a zero-NPV investment, then one should be careful in assuming that
the investment policy and the payout policy will change in the future. While some authors
correctly recognize that only cash flows paid to shareholders should be used for valuation
several authors in applied
corporate finance and a large part of practitioners use potential dividends for computing a firm’s
equity value This paper aims at showing that the practice of adding excess cash to the
cash flows actually paid is at odds with finance theory. Cash Flow to Equity should be defined
as dividends paid minus net capital contributions, i.e. dividends plus shares repurchases minus
new equity investment.