| In Puerto Rico, as well as in all of the world's countries, the small and medium enterprises stand for the most important sector of the economy. These companies nourish and provide products and services that constitute a determining force in the economic activity and employment creation. Nonetheless, they face great challenges to obtain financing. The limited access to credit presents itself as a problem to the development of this type of enterprise. This exploratory and descriptive investigation analyzed the main barriers faced by the owners of small and medium enterprises and the factors that influence decisions about the type of financing used. The proposed model of the determinants of the capital structure of small and medium enterprises of the Autonomous Municipality of Caguas consists of five determinant factors in the capital structure. It is suggested that the size of the company, age of the company, availability of financial information, guarantees required and knowledge of financing options influence the type of financing that its used. For the empirical significance and relevance of the model, a multivariate analysis was used, which includes the study of Partial Least Square Path (PLS) in a sample of 99 small and medium enterprises. The results indicate significant relationships between financial information, guarantees, and the size of the enterprise over the capital structure. On the other hand, data found demonstrated obstacles or major barriers to obtain financing due to the company size, its antiquity, guarantee requirements, bank bureaucracy, lack of credit history, previous applications and absence of long-term loans. Among them, the greatest obstacles were the guarantee requirements and the company size. The results corroborate the Hierarchy Preferences Theory of Myers and Majluf, the Credit Rationing Theory and the financial life cycle according to Berger and Udell. The results suggest that the government should focus in the small and medium enterprises as the strategy for economic development for Puerto Rico and lines of investigation that contribute new alternatives to the creation, development and sustainability of such an important sector. |
