shares of marriott intl inc mar rose by 1356 in the past three months when understanding a companies price change over a time period like 3 months it could be helpful to look at its financials one key aspect of a companies financials is its debt but before we understand the importance of debt lets look at how much debt marriott intl has according to the marriott intls most recent financial statement as reported on may 2 2023 total debt is at 1066 billion with 1030 billion in longterm debt and 35800 million in current debt adjusting for 55400 million in cashequivalents the company has a net debt of 1010 billion lets define some of the terms we used in the paragraph above current debt is the portion of a companys debt which is due within 1 year while longterm debt is the portion due in more than 1 year cash equivalents includes cash and any liquid securities with maturity periods of 90 days or less total debt equals current debt plus longterm debt minus cash equivalents shareholders look at the debtratio to understand how much financial leverage a company has marriott intl has 2486 billion in total assets therefore making the debtratio 043 as a rule of thumb a debtratio more than 1 indicates that a considerable portion of debt is funded by assets a higher debtratio can also imply that the company might be putting itself at risk for default if interest rates were to increase however debtratios vary widely across different industries a debt ratio of 35 might be higher for one industry but average for another debt is an important factor in the capital structure of a company and can help it attain growth debt usually has a relatively lower financing cost than equity which makes it an attractive option for executives interestpayment obligations can impact the cashflow of the company equity owners can keep excess profit generated from the debt capital when companies use the debt capital for its business operations looking for stocks with low debttoequity ratios check out benzinga pro a market research platform which provides investors with nearinstantaneous access to dozens of stock metrics  including debttoequity ratio click here to learn more this article was generated by benzingas automated content engine and reviewed by an editor