Abstract
The purpose of this study is to investigate how firm-specific
characteristics determine capital structure as empirical evidence on
Jordanian firms listed on Amman exchange market. In which study
covers 80 firms (55) manufacturing and (25) service firms for the
period (2001 - 2006). The study used ordinary least squares (OLS)
regression technique to provide an evidence how firm—specific
characteristics presented by tangible assets, size, growth, profitability
and risk which is derived from tradeoff and pecking order theories to
determine capital structure presented by short term debt ratio, long
term debt ratio and total debt ratio. Furthermore, the regression results
proved that firm characteristics play important role to determine
capital structure.