Integration and interdependence of stock and foreign exchange markets: an Australian perspective

This paper examines the integration of the Australian stock market with its two leading trading partners, the US and Japan. In investigating the extent of integration, this study takes into account the interdependence between foreign exchange rates and stock prices, since exchange rates influence international competitiveness of firms, and, via interest rates, the cost of capital. The results indicate that there was a stable long-run relationship among the Australian, US and Japanese markets prior to the Asian crisis but that this relationship disappeared in the post-Asian crisis period. An analysis of the short-run dynamic linkages among markets suggests that, following the Asian crisis, the US influence on the Australian market diminished while the influence of Japan remained at a modest level. Furthermore, the impulse response analysis indicates only a contemporaneous transmission of shocks from one market to other markets. Confidence intervals for impulse responses are estimated using the bootstrap-after-bootstrap method.     

Footprints in the market: Hedge funds and the carry trade

This paper uses a new database provided by the Commodity and Futures Trading Commissions to examine the price impact of hedge fund carry trades in “hot” and “cold” markets. We find that hedge funds significantly increase their carry trade positions during hot markets (periods with very high currency returns). Consistent with currency overpricing, positions in hot markets are followed by exchange rate reversals. Optimism in the stock market seems to have a spillover effect on hedge fund speculation in the currency market: controlling for the variance risk premium fully accounts for the reversal effect. Overall, our results add to a growing body of empirical evidence that institutional demand can move asset prices.     

Do economic statistics contain information to predict stock indexes futures prices and returns? Evidence from Asian equity futures markets

This research examines the impact of local and international market factors on the pricing of stock indexes futures in East Asian countries. The purpose of this paper is to present a study of the significant factors that determine the major stock indexes futures’ prices of Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan. This study first investigates the relationships between Hang Seng Index Futures, KLCI Futures, SiMSCI Futures, KOSPI Futures, Taiwan Exchange Index Futures and local interest rates, dividend yields, local exchange rates, overnight S&P500 index and a newly constructed index, Asian Tigers Malaysia Index (ATMI). 11 years historical data of stock indexes futures and the economic statistics are studied; 10 years in-sample data are used for testing and developing the pricing models, and 1 year out-of-sample data is used for the purpose of verifying the predicted values of the stock indexes futures. Using simple linear regressions, local interest rates, dividend yields, exchange rates, overnight S&P500 and ATMI are found to have significant impact on these futures contracts. In this research, the next period close is predicted using simple linear regression and non-linear artificial neural network (ANN). An examination of the prediction results using nonlinear autoregressive ANN with exogenous inputs (NARX) shows significant abnormal returns above the passive threshold buy and hold market returns and also above the profits of simple linear regression (SLR). The empirical evidence of this research suggests that economic statistics contain information which can be extracted using a hybrid SLR and NARX trading model to predict futures prices with some degree of confidence for a year forward. This justifies further research and development of pricing models using fundamentally significant economic determinants to predict futures prices.

     

RESPONSE OF FINANCIAL MARKETS TO ANNOUNCEMENTS OF THE AUSTRALIAN CURRENT ACCOUNT BALANCE

This paper documents the response of exchange rates, interest rates and stock prices to monthly announcements of the Australian current account balance. Survey data on market participants' expectations and forecasts generated from ARIMA time series models are used to identify the unexpected component of the announcements. The study also controls for day-of-the-week effects that have been documented in the Australian equity market The results support the efficient market hypothesis and show a significant depreciation of the Australian dollar in foreign exchange markets and a significant rise in both short- and long-term interest rates to announcements of larger than expected current account deficits. The study was, however, unable to find evidence of a significant stock price response to the current account announcements.     

Price Interactions in a Sequential Global Market: Evidence from the Cross-listed Stocks

In this paper, we investigate the pattern of dynamic interactions among the prices of those stocks that are cross-listed on the three major stock markets of the world, i.e. New York, London and Tokyo. Major findings are: first, regardless of the nationality of stocks, innovations in the 'home' market returns are always fed into the returns in the 'overseas' markets, with the former causing the latter in the Granger sense. However, innovations in the New York market returns of foreign stocks are fed back into their respective home markets, contributing to the price discovery there. Second, the 'succeeding' overseas market, which operates immediately after the home market, plays a dual-role: it conducts the home market innovations to the next-opening overseas market, as well as adds its own innovations. Third, the exchange rate changes substantially influence the overseas market returns, but not the home market returns. The exchange rates appear to play a role in the transmission mechanism mainly via the inter-market price parity.     

The joint response of stock and foreign exchange markets to macroeconomic surprises: Using US and Japanese data

This paper investigates the joint response of stock and foreign exchange (FX) market returns to macroeconomic surprises, employing a system method of estimation that allows for the cross-country and cross-market interaction for asset returns and risk premia. Using US and Japanese data, we find that US stock markets are asymmetrically responsive to domestic developments in output growth and interest rates but are not influenced by macroeconomic surprises from Japan. The surprise in the FX market seems to affect stock markets in the US and Japan, respectively. In particular, we find that the interest rate surprise in the US and inflation surprise in Japan tend to overstate the impact that these surprises would have on the respective stock market. The impact of the surprises would appear smaller if macroeconomic developments induced by the FX market were incorporated into the model.     

The determination and international transmission of stock market volatility

This paper extends the literature on low-frequency analysis of the causes and transmission of stock market volatility. It uses end-monthly data on stock market returns, interest rates, exchange rates, inflation, and industrial production for five countries (Britain, France, Germany, Japan, and the US) from July 1973 to December 1994. Efficient portfolios of world, European, and Japanese/US equity are first constructed, the existence of multivariate cointegrating relationships between them is demonstrated, and the transmission of conditional volatility between them is described. The transmission of conditional volatility from world equity markets and national business cycle variables to national stock markets is then modeled. Among the main findings are: first, world equity market volatility is caused mostly by volatility in Japanese/US markets and transmitted to European markets, and second, changes in the volatility of inflation are associated with changes of the opposite sign in stock market volatility in all markets where a significant effect is found to exist. To the extent that the volatility of inflation is positively related to its level, this implies that low inflation tends to be associated with high stock market volatility.     

Commodity Prices and Stock Market Behavior in South American Countries in the Short Run

Using Geweke feedback measures, we present empirical evidence that largely supports the hypothesis that the stock markets of South American countries are highly affected by changes in commodity prices after controlling for changes in exchange rates, interest rates, and North American stock market changes. In total, six different Goldman Sachs commodity price indexes are tested against the unexplained variation in stock market returns for Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Peru, and Venezuela, covering the period 1995-2007. The Argentinian, Brazilian, and Peruvian stock markets are significantly affected by changes in commodity prices the same day. Venezuela's stock market, however, does not react to changes in commodity prices, even including energy prices. Stock market returns for Chile show a contemporaneous relation with energy and metals prices, whereas Colombia's equity market is affected by price changes for agricultural and industrial metals. In all cases, we find a contemporaneous relation and no indication of a lead or lag relationship.     

Causality in volatility and volatility spillover effects between US, Japan and four equity markets in the South China Growth Triangular

In examining co-movement across international stock markets, previous researchers usually pre-determine the direction of causation and neglect the Chinese equity markets. In this study, we examine the spillover effects of volatility among the two developed markets and four emerging markets in the South China Growth Triangular using Chueng and Ng's causality-in-variance test. Several findings deserve mention: (1) the Japanese stock market affects the US stock market and there is a feedback relationship between the Hong Kong and US stock market. (2) Markets of the SCGT are contemporaneously correlated with the return volatility of the US market. (3) Econometric models constructed according to the results of variance-in-causality tests have greater explanatory power than the conventional GARCH(1,1) model. (4) Using the return volatility of foreign exchange as a proxy for informational arrival can explain excess kurtosis of a stock return series, especially for the less open emerging market. (5) Geographic proximity and economic ties do not necessarily lead to a strong relationship in volatility across markets.     

The Week-End Effect in Common Stock Returns: The International Evidence

This paper examines the daily stock market returns for four foreign countries. We find a so-called “week-end effect” in each country. In addition, the lowest mean returns for the Japanese and Australian stock markets occur on Tuesday. The remainder of the paper answers four questions. Are seasonal patterns in foreign stock markets independent of those previously reported in the U.S.? Do Japan and Australia exhibit a seasonal one day out of phase due to different time zones? Do settlement procedures across countries bias week-end effects? Does the seasonal pattern in foreign exchange offset the week-end effect in stocks for Americans investing overseas?     

Corporate cash flow and stock price exposures to foreign exchange rate risk

This paper estimates the foreign exchange rate exposure of 6917 U.S. nonfinancial firms on the basis of stock prices and corporate cash flows. The results show that several firms are significantly exposed to at least one of the foreign exchange rates Canadian Dollar, Japanese Yen and Euro, and significant exposures are more frequent at longer horizons. The percentage of firms for which stock price and earnings exposures are significantly different is relatively low, though it increases with time horizon. Overall, the impact of exchange rate risk on stock prices and cash flows is similar and determined by a related set of economic factors.     

On jump processes in the foreign exchange and stock markets

This article investigates the existence of discontinuities inthe sample path of exchange rates and of a stock market index.Maximum-likelihood estimation of a mixed jump-diffusion processreveals that exchange rates exhibit systematic discontuinities,even after allowing for conditional heteroskedasticity in thediffusion process. The results are much more significant inthe foreign exchange market than in the stock market, whichsuggests differences in the structure of these markets. Finally,this jump component is shown to explain some of the empiricallyobserved mispricings in the currency options market.     

Volatility and correlation in international stock markets and the role of exchange rate fluctuations

This paper develops a direct, explicit model for the role of exchange rate fluctuations in international stock markets and examines how and to what extent volatility and correlations in equity markets are influenced by exchange rate fluctuations. Evidence presented in this paper indicates that a higher foreign exchange rate variability mostly increases local stock market volatility but decreases volatility for the US stock market. The extent to which stock market volatility is influenced by foreign exchange variability is greater for local markets than for the US market, due to the fact that exchange rate changes are more strongly correlated with local equity market returns than the US market returns. We find that a higher exchange rate fluctuation marginally decreases the US/local equity market correlation. While exchange rate fluctuations held a relatively large fraction of the variation in local stock market returns, there was no significant influence on the US/local equity market correlation.     

Temporal Patterns in Foreign Exchange Returns and Options

Although the foreign exchange market is believed to be one of the most efficient financial markets in the world, there is significant evidence that technical analysis is profitable in this market. In this study we investigate the ability of information from the options market to supplement the commonly used information on past prices to predict temporal patterns in foreign exchange returns. We find that strategies using information from at-the-money options were more consistently profitable than the commonly used strategies based on only historical spot exchange rates (past prices). Consequently, options appear to contain information regarding future spot exchange rate movements.     

What Influences Stock Market Behavior in Russia and Other Emerging Countries?

We empirically test the dependence of the Russian stock market on the world stock market and world oil prices in the period 1997:10–2012:02. We also analyze countries that can be considered to be relatively similar to Russia, e.g., Poland, the Czech Republic, and South Africa. First, we apply a rolling regression to identify periods when oil prices or stock indices in the United States and Japan were important. Surprisingly, oil prices are not significant for the Russian stock market after 2006. Second, we employ a TGARCH-BEKK model to assess the degree of correlation between the markets in question, taking into account the global market stochastic trend. Correlation between markets increased between 2000 and 2012.     

Forecasting Emerging Market Exchange Rates from Foreign Equity Options

The use of derivatives to infer future exchange rates has long been a subject of interest in the international finance literature. With the recent currency crises in Mexico, Southeast Asia, and Brazil, work on exchange rate expectations in emerging markets is of particular interest. For some emerging markets, foreign equity options are the only liquid exchange‐traded derivatives with currency information embedded in their prices. Given that emerging markets sometimes undergo currency realignment with discrete jumps in their exchange rate, estimation of risk‐neutral probability density functions from foreign equity option data provides valuable evidence concerning market expectations. To illustrate the use of foreign equity options in estimating market beliefs, we consider Telmex options around the 1994 peso devaluation and find evidence that markets anticipated the change in the Mexican government's foreign exchange policy.     

Forecasting foreign exchange rates using idiosyncratic volatility

Average idiosyncratic stock volatility forecasts the bilateral exchange rates of the US dollar against major foreign currencies in and out of sample. The US dollar tends to appreciate after an increase in US idiosyncratic volatility. Similarly, ceteris paribus, German and Japanese idiosyncratic volatilities positively and significantly correlate with future US dollar prices of the Deutsche mark and the Japanese yen, respectively. Our results suggest that exchange rates are predictable.     

Devaluation-risk-related peso problems in stock returns

The phenomenon of a non-random negative trend in stock prices is usually explained on the macroeconomic level, either by constantly rising risk premia or by a trend in other macroeconomic factors that affect the stock market as a whole. In this paper it is argued that a negative trend in individual stock prices can be caused by a firm-level peso problem related to devaluation expectations. If the devaluation-risk-related peso problem hypothesis is correct, the share prices of companies with a higher foreign exchange rate exposure should react more strongly to the phenomenon than the stock prices of firms with a lower level of exposure. Cross-sectional regression analysis on the individual firm level is used to test for the hypothesis. Empirical findings based on Finnish data from the period 1989 through 1992 strongly support the proposed hypothesis.     

汇率与股价的溢出效应及长期联动性——基于汇改后中国市场的实证研究

随着中国资本市场改革的深化,市场间的互动关系逐步回归市场化关联。本文运用协整检验、Granger因果检验、多元GARCH模型研究了汇率与股价的互动关系。研究结果表明:在长期联动性方面,汇率与股价存在稳定的长期均衡关系;在价格溢出方面,只存在汇率到股价的单向引导关系;波动溢出方面,汇市的波动冲击会影响股市,而股市的波动对汇市无明显影响。进一步的研究中,本文估算了汇率波动对股市开盘价及收盘价的影响大小。     

Dynamic relationship between exchange rate and stock price: Evidence from China

The paper empirically analyzes the dynamic relationship between Renminbi (RMB) real effective exchange rate and stock price with VAR and multivariate generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH) models using monthly data from January 1991 to June 2009. The results show that there is not a stable long-term equilibrium relationship between RMB real effective exchange rate and stock price. There are also not mean spillovers between the foreign exchange and stock markets. Furthermore, the paper examines the cross-volatility effects between foreign exchange and stock markets using likelihood ratio statistic. There exist the bidirection volatility spillovers effects between the two markets, indicating the past innovations in stock market have the great effect on future volatility in foreign exchange market, and vice versa.