Does public offering improve company’s financial performance? The example of Poland

Abstract

The main aim of this article is to compare the financial performance of private and publicly traded companies in accordance with ownership structure and size. The analysis carried out in the article leads to the conclusion that in Poland private companies perform better than companies that are publicly traded on the Warsaw Stock Exchange (WSE). Statistically significant results are obtained for medium-sized companies. Moreover, it turns out that medium-sized enterprises operate better than large companies as far as profitability is concerned, at least in the group of private companies where results are statistically significant. The analyses conducted in the article are aimed at filling in the gap in studies comparing profitability between publicly traded and private companies.