Total-Debt-to-Total-Assets Ratio

What Is the Total-Debt-to-Total-Assets Ratio?

Total-debt-to-total-assets is a leverage ratio that defines the total amount of debt relative to assets owned by a company. Using this metric, analysts can compare one company's leverage with that of other companies in the same industry. This information can reflect how financially stable a company is. The higher the ratio, the higher the degree of leverage (DoL) and, consequently, the higher the risk of investing in that company.

Understanding the Total-Debt-to-Total-Assets Ratio

The total-debt-to-total-assets ratio analyzes a company's balance sheet by including long-term and short-term debt (borrowings maturing within one year), as well as all assets — both tangible and intangible, such as goodwill. It indicates how much debt is used to carry a firm's assets, and how those assets might be used to service debt. It therefore measures a firm's degree of leverage.

Debt servicing payments must be made under all circumstances, otherwise the company would breach its debt covenants and run the risk of being forced into bankruptcy by creditors. While other liabilities such as accounts payable and long-term leases can be negotiated to some extent, there is very little “wiggle room” with debt covenants.

A company with a high degree of leverage may thus find it more difficult to stay afloat during a recession than one with low leverage. It should be noted that the total debt measure does not include short-term liabilities such as accounts payable and long-term liabilities such as capital leases and pension plan obligations.

The Formula for Total-Debt-to-Total-Assets Is

TD/TA = Short-Term Debt + Long-Term Debt Total Assets \begin{aligned} &\text{TD/TA} = \frac{ \text{Short-Term Debt} + \text{Long-Term Debt} }{ \text{Total Assets} } \\ \end{aligned} TD/TA=Total AssetsShort-Term Debt+Long-Term Debt

What Does the Total-Debt-to-Total-Assets Ratio Tell You?

Total-debt-to-total-assets is a measure of the company's assets that are financed by debt rather than equity. When calculated over a number of years, this leverage ratio shows how a company has grown and acquired its assets as a function of time.

Investors use the ratio to evaluate whether the company has enough funds to meet its current debt obligations and to assess whether the company can pay a return on its investment. Creditors use the ratio to see how much debt the company already has and whether the company can repay its existing debt. This will determine whether additional loans will be extended to the firm.

A ratio greater than 1 shows that a considerable portion of the assets is funded by debt. In other words, the company has more liabilities than assets. A high ratio also indicates that a company may be putting itself at risk of defaulting on its loans if interest rates were to rise suddenly.

A ratio below 1, meanwhile, indicates that a greater portion of a company's assets is funded by equity.

Real World Example of the Total-Debt-to-Total-Assets Ratio

Let's examine the total-debt-to total-assets ratio for three companies — The Walt Disney Company, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc., and Sears Holdings Corporation — for the fiscal year (FY) ended 2017 (December 31, 2016, for Chipotle).

Debt to Assets Comparison

(data in millions)

Chipotle

Total Assets

Total Debt to Assets

Debt to Assets Comparison

From the example above, Sears is shown to have a much higher degree of leverage than Disney and Chipotle and, therefore, a lower degree of financial flexibility. With more than $13 billion in total debt, it is easy to understand why Sears was forced to declare Chapter 11 bankruptcy in October 2018. Investors and creditors considered Sears a risky company to invest in and loan to due to its very high leverage.

Limitations of the Total-Debt-to-Total-Assets Ratio

One shortcoming of the total-debt-to-total-assets ratio is that it does not provide any indication of asset quality since it lumps all tangible and intangible assets together. For example, assume from the example above that Disney took on $50.8 billion of long-term debt to acquire a competitor and booked $20 billion as a goodwill intangible asset for this acquisition.

If the acquisition does not perform as expected and results in the entire goodwill asset being written off, the ratio of total debt to total assets (which would now be $95.8 billion - $20 billion = $75.8 billion) would be 0.67.

As with all other ratios, the trend of the total-debt-to-total-assets ratio should be evaluated over time. This will help assess whether the company’s financial risk profile is improving or deteriorating. For example, an increasing trend indicates that a business is unwilling or unable to pay down its debt, which could indicate a default in the future.