The ongoing debate on optimal capital structure is one of the core issues of corporate finance literature since it is initially and academically presented by Modigliani and Miller (M-M theorem 1958 & 1963). Nonetheless, the existing corporate finance literature hardly provides global empirical evidence on the impact of financial leverage on firm value. To address the issue, based on cross-country panel testbed as of Dec. 2004–Dec. 2018 for high and low geared firms, the test results indicate that the overall firm performances of high geared firms are significantly lower than those of low geared firms. We document that high geared firms are financially less stable, and thus subject to lower value as compared to counterpart ones, because additional debt can cause value destruction due to bankruptcy. Interestingly, our finding is consistent across different dimensions: cross-country, cross-industry, size group, and period analysis. However, this empirical evidence is inconsistent with M-M propositions on capital structure irrelevance theory (1958; 1963). The underlying probable reason could be that M-M theory is based on the assumptions of a perfect world which makes the theory idealistic, impractical & dead in real world. Hence, by addressing a core issue of corporate finance, the study notably contributes for providing a global evidence of the impact of leverage on firm performance. Therefore, this study significantly contributes to deeply rethinking the proposition of financial gearing on firm value; and thereby to design the optimal capital structure decision for sustainable finance and responsible investments for wealth maximization.

关于最佳资本结构的持续辩论是公司融资文学的核心问题之一，因为它最初是由Modigliani和Miller（M-M定理（1958和1963）。但是，现有的公司财务文献几乎无法提供有关财务杠杆对公司价值影响的全球经验证据。为了解决这个问题，基于2004年12月至12月的越野小组测试平台。2018年高，低负债企业的测试结果表明，高负债企业的整体绩效显着低于低负债企业的绩效。我们记录到，高负债公司的财务状况较不稳定，因此与同行公司相比价值较低，因为额外的债务可能会因破产而造成价值损失。有趣的是，我们的发现在不同维度上是一致的：跨国，跨行业，规模组和期间分析。但是，这种经验证据与M不一致-M关于资本结构不相关理论的命题（1958； 1963）。潜在的原因可能是M- M理论是基于一个理想世界的假设，该假设使该理论在现实世界中变得理想化，不切实际并且死了。因此，通过解决公司财务的核心问题，该研究尤其有助于提供全球性证据，证明杠杆对公司绩效的影响。因此，这项研究极大地有助于重新思考金融杠杆对企业价值的主张。从而为可持续金融和负责任的投资设计最佳的资本结构决策，以实现财富最大化。