Abstract:

The aim of the article was to examine whether being part of a capital group brings cash benefits to the participant. For this purpose, two indicators were used: the ratio of the holding company’s cash flows to the corporate group’s total cash flows (CF) and the holding company’s operating cash flows to the corporate group’s total operating cash flows (CFO). This article follows on from the research carried out in 2013 by expanding it to include more capital groups and a longer study period. Eighty-five consolidated and individual financial statements for 2009-2018 of the capital groups listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange were used to verify the research question of whether being part of a capital group generates any additional benefits to the participant. The research results do not unequivocally indicate that capital groups generate additional cash or total and operating flows, which means that belonging to capital groups does not generate additional benefits to the participants. The results of the analysis show that the hypothesis of the research has been verified negatively. There are no indications that additional benefits can be gained through functioning in a capital group such as additional cash generated by the capital group as an entity accumulating surpluses from all group members.