This work provides an analysis of the debt burden of Russian companies and raises the issue of debt-level heterogeneity across economic sectors. In order to identify the causes of this heterogeneity, we estimated a regression model that included both the fundamental explanatory variables of companies and industry fixed effects. The results of the analysis demonstrated that standard variables such as profitability, company size, asset turnover and fixed-asset turnover ratio have a strong statistical significance. However, these do not fully explain the variation in the debt levels of companies in different sectors. According to model estimation, there are industry specific factors that produce an imbalance between fundamental factors and companies' debt levels. An understanding of the formation process and structure of debt burden in individual industries is extremely important for the financial stability of companies, and effective monetary policy.