Intangible assets as drivers of firm's market value? - Empirical evidence from german DAX 30-companies 1998-2007

Abstract

{Intangible assets are classified as resources that generate competitive advantages and thus are positively linked to the firm's market value. For the U.S. capital market, studies like Gu/Lev (2001) also find empirical evidence for this assumption. There is lack of proof though for German firms like the DAX 30-companies as studies from Germany exclusively focus on capitalized intangible assets. The goal of this paper is to empirically examine intangible assets as a whole as drivers of firms' market value, using data from 22 German DAX-30-companies for the period 1998-2007. Evidence is found that intangible assets and market value are indeed correlated: This linkage should not be overrated though, as a regression analysis shows that influence on market values is stronger for tangible than for intangible assets.}