Availability and settlement of individual stock futures and options expiration-day effects: evidence from high-frequency data

This study examines whether the expiration-day effects of stock options traded in Australian Stock Exchange on return, volatility, trading volume, and temporary price changes of individual stocks vary with the availability and the settlement method of individual stock futures contracts. Using transaction data of the stocks that have both options and futures contacts from 1993 to 1997, we find that options expiration has significant effects on return and volatility of the underlying stocks in absence of individual stock futures. After introduction of a cash-settled stock futures contract, the effects decrease notably. However, the switch of a futures contract from cash settlement to physical delivery promotes the expiration effects on return and volatility and boosts temporary price changes on expiration days. Finally, options expiration has little effect on trading volume. Trading activity tends to behave normally regardless whether stock futures contracts are available or not.     

Immunizing Foreign Exchange Contracts Against Swap Rate and Volatility Risks

Swap rate risk, also called the problem of' "maturity gaps," originates from foreign currency holdings whenever the involved contracts have differing maturities. Such differing maturities give rise to a sensitivity of the portfolio values with respect to the "swap rate," or differential between the relative interest rates in two countries. Volatility risk, which typically affects only currency contracts having asymmetric payoffs (such as currency options), gives rise to a sensitivity of portfolio values with respect to changes in the exchange rate volatility. In this article we show how currency portfolios may be immunized , or made insensitive, to both swap rate risk and volatility risk, in the sense of Macaulay's (1938) classical treatment of interest rate risk. The European currency option contract is the primary subject of our discussion, since we show that both ordinary forward contracts and other complicated currency contracts are equivalent to suitable combinations of European currency options.     

Index futures trading and stock price volatility: Evidence from Denmark and France

This study uses an EGARCH methodology to investigate the impact of index futures trading on the price volatility of two European stock markets. The results show that index futures trading has changed the distribution of stock returns in Denmark and France, however, it has not increased stock price volatility. There is evidence that futures trading has dampened stock price fluctuations in France. The results further show that stocks in Denmark and France exhibit strong volatility persistence and asymmetry, especially during the post-futures period.     

Evidence of information transmission across currency futures markets using frequency domain tests

In this article, I examine the returns and volatility spillovers in the currency futures market incorporating the recently developed frequency domain tests. Such analysis allows differentiating between permanent (long-run) and transitory (short-run) linkages among the currency futures markets by investigating the causality dynamics at low and high frequencies respectively. I detect significant informational linkages between USD, EUR, GBP and JPY futures contracts in the Indian currency futures market. Evidence of innovations from USD futures market to other markets is the most significant for returns spillover and for volatility spillover, EUR is found to be the most significant compared to other currency futures contracts. The results would have implications for the market participants and policymakers.     

Open interest,volume, and volatility: evidence from Taiwan futures markets

This paper examines the relationships amongst volatility, total trading volume (TVOL) and total open interest (TOI) for three Taiwan stock index futures markets as well as the role of the latter two variables in the dynamics of GARCH modeling and forecasting. From both ex-post and ex-ante perspectives, we study this issue by using the VAR model and augmented GARCH-type models, respectively. For the GARCH-type models, we employ both symmetric and asymmetric models augmented with lagged logs in TOI and/or TVOL. We find that whether addition of these two variables helps the basic GARCH models predict future volatility depends upon the sample period examined for all three sets of futures. Nonetheless, the best three models for out-of-sample volatility forecasting in the MSE sense are generally the augmented models for all sub-intervals and all three futures contracts.     

Time-series properties and predictability of Greek exchange rates

This paper explores the time-series properties and predictability of weekly percentage changes in the Greek drachma exchange rates with respect to the currencies of major trading-partner countries, such as the USA, Germany, the UK, France, Italy and Japan. The analysis is carried out using the EGARCH-M model along with the power exponential distribution. Percentage changes in the Greek drachma with respect to the German mark, the French franc, the Italian lira and Japanese yen are predictable using past information. The volatility of Greek exchange rates is best represented by an EGARCH process and as such is predictable using past volatility measures. Moreover, volatility of the Greek drachma with respect to the German mark and Italian lira positively influences future movements in these exchange rates. The hypothesis that volatility is an asymmetric function of past innovations is rejected in all cases. Following the inclusion of the Greek drachma in the ECU currency basket, its value has been depreciating at a higher rate with respect to the German mark and Italian lira and at a lower rate with respect to the US dollar. Also, its volatility with respect to the German mark, the French franc, and the Italian lira has decreased, whereas its volatility with respect to the US dollar has increased.     

An error-correction model for forecasting changes in foreign currency futures spreads

The foreign currency futures pricing model of Amin and Jarrow (1991) is used to develop a model that predicts the primary determinants of foreign currency futures spreads. Our data set consists of daily observations of futures prices, spot exchange rates, and Eurocurrency LIBOR for the British pound and Japanese yen from January 2, 1990 to December 31, 2004. Using a 5-year moving window methodology, we find repeated evidence of cointegration between the futures spread, spot exchange rates, and interest rates over ten different estimation periods. An errorcorrection model is used to develop a trading strategy that generates significant out-of-sample profits.     

S&P 500 futures market and the normal backwardation hypothesis

This paper examines the behavior of near term S&P 500 index futures contract prices in the context of the theory of normal backwardation. Daily S&P 500 futures prices for 41 contracts over the 1982–1992 period are examined. There is no evidence that S&P 500 futures prices are biased estimates of the expected future spot price on expiration. Daily futures prices usually lie below the expected future spot price on expiration and usually rise over the contract period, but these price movements are not statistically significant. The surprising result of this study is the number of observations where backwardation appears not to hold. Furthermore, changes in the U.S. dollar exchange rates, the Tax Reform Act of 1986 and the switching of S&P 500 contracts quarterly expiration day had no significant effect on the behavior of S&P 500 futures prices.     

The role of oil futures intraday information on predicting US stock market volatility

This study investigates the role of oil futures price information on forecasting the US stock market volatility using the HAR framework. In-sample results indicate that oil futures intraday information is helpful to increase the predictability. Moreover, compared to the benchmark model, the proposed models improve their predictive ability with the help of oil futures realized volatility. In particular, the multivariate HAR model outperforms the univariate model. Accordingly, considering the contemporaneous connection is useful to predict the US stock market volatility. Furthermore, these findings are consistent across a variety of robust checks.     

Crack spread hedging: accounting for time‐varying volatility spillovers in the energy futures markets

Crude oil, heating oil, and unleaded gasoline futures contracts are simultaneously analysed for their effectiveness in reducing price volatility for an energy trader. A conceptual model is developed for a trader hedging the ‘crack spread’. Various hedge ratio estimation techniques are compared to a Multivariate GARCH model that directly incorporates the time to maturity effect often found in futures markets. Modelling of the time‐variation in hedge ratios via the Multivariate GARCH methodology, and thus taking into account volatility spillovers between markets is shown to result in significant reductions in uncertainty even while accounting for trading costs. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An empirical analysis of the Carbon Financial Instrument

This study provides an empirical investigation of the price volatility—trading volume relationship for the Carbon Financial Instrument (CFI). A CFI is a financial contract that is traded on the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX) and represents the right to emit 100 metric tons of CO₂ equivalent. CFI contracts differ from one another on the basis of their allocation year to CCX member firms, referred to as their respective Vintage year. We provide evidence indicating a positive contemporaneous relationship between price changes and trading volume for the different CFI Vintage contracts. Employing bivariate VAR models that adjust for trade duration, we find that CFI price volatility and trading volume are persistent across time. Furthermore, we provide evidence indicating that lagged volume increases price volatility, in addition to lagged price volatility increasing trading volume levels in the CCX market. Our results are in agreement with prior research documenting significant positive price volatility—volume relationships in traditional equity markets.     

上海期货交易所的涨跌停板制度对波动性的影响

本文通过对上海期货交易所的三个品种的涨跌停板制度进行检验,检验方法为:从收益率所拟和的ARMA模型中滤出残差,进行波动率的GARCH模型回归。波动率模型中加入了哑元变量来体现涨停板对后一日波动的影响。实证结果显示,铜、铝、天然橡胶的涨跌停板本应显著地使收益率的波动率减小的作用未检验出,相反却得到涨停板使三个品种显著波动率增大的检验结果。是否需要扩大涨跌停板,提高市场效率?检验结果带给我们如何使涨跌停板制度趋于合理化的思考。     

The Yen as an International Currency

Japanese policy-makers have spent many years attempting to increase the role of the Yen as a regional and international currency. In this article Francis Breedon and Geoffrey Williams look at its role both before and after the Asian currency crisis. Pre-crisis they find that the Yen was of less regional importance than economic theory would suggest, so that its rapid depreciation from 1995 to 1997 did not influence regional currencies as much as it perhaps should have. Since the Asian crisis they find that its regional role has increased markedly, largely at the expense of the Dollar. This suggests that Yen volatility, which remains considerable, is likely to have more impact on regional Dollar exchange rates and thus less impact on real activity than before.     

Testing the stabilization hypothesis in the UK short-term interest rates: Evidence from a GARCH-X model

The objective of this paper is to examine the validity of one of the recurring arguments made against futures markets that they give rise to price instability. The paper concentrates on the impact of futures trading on the spot market volatility of short-term interest rates. The analytical framework employed is based on a new statistical approach aiming to reconcile the traditional models of short-term interest rates and the conditional volatility processes. More specifically, this class of models aims to capture the dynamics of short-term interest rate volatility by allowing volatility to depend on both scale effects and information shocks. Using a GARCH-X and asymmetric GARCH-X model four main conclusions emerge from the present study. First, the empirical results suggest that there is an indisputable change in the nature of volatility with evidence of mean reversion after the onset of futures trading. Second, the information flow into the market has improved as a result of futures trading. Third, a stabilization effect has been detected running from the futures market to the cash market by lowering volatility levels and decreasing the risk in the spot market. Finally, trying to capture the leverage effect the findings suggest that positive shocks have a greater impact on volatility than negative shocks.     

成交量、持仓量对我国大豆类期货价差波动影响的实证分析

采用GARCH(1,1)模型就成交量、持仓量对大豆类期货价差波动率的影响进行实证分析,结果显示：当期成交量、持仓量对大豆期货价差波动的整体影响是显著的;滞后成交量、持仓量对大豆期货价差波动的整体影响也是显著的;当成交量、持仓量同时进入条件方差方程时,它们对大豆类期货价差波动的影响整体上也是显著的。这一结论揭示了我国大豆期货市场信息传递过程,验证了我国大豆期货市场的信息非有效性,对期货市场投资者以及期货市场监管者具有一定的借鉴意义。     

States of psychological anchors and price behavior of Japanese yen futures

This study explores whether the relationship between Japanese yen futures returns and the corresponding equity returns is affected by the states of psychological anchors of the currency and stock markets. This study employs the linear-regression-based tree model (a machine learning method) to account for the framing effect of the anchors. The empirical results of the linear-regression-based tree model show that the currency price behaviors of momentum and reversal, and prediction by equity markets, vary with the anchors. Empirical evidence also indicates that the linear-regression-based tree model outperforms the OLS model based on the estimation results and out-of-sample forecasting. The forecasting performance of the linear-regression-based tree model can be improved along with an increase in the forecasting period.     

Forecast on silver futures linked with structural breaks and day-of-the-week effect

Silver future is crucial to global financial markets. However, the existing literature rarely considers the impacts of structural breaks and day-of-the-week effect simultaneously on the volatility of silver future price. Based on heterogeneous autoregressive (HAR) theory, we establish six new type heterogeneous autoregressive (HAR) models by incorporating structural breaks and day-of-the-week effect to forecast the volatility. The empirical results indicate that new models’ accuracy is better than the original HAR model. We find that structural breaks and the day-of-the-week effect contain much forecasting information on silver forecasting. In addition, structural breaks have a positive effect on the silver futures’ volatility. Day-of-the-week effect has a significantly negative influence on silver futures’ price volatility, especially in the mid-term and the long-term. Our works is the first to combine the structural breaks and day-of-the-week effect to identify more market information. This paper provides a better forecasting method to predict silver future volatility.     

Thin trading and mispricing profit opportunities in the Canadian commodity futures

This study examines whether thin trading problems in the Canadian futures market can create mispricing profit opportunities for canola and feed wheat futures traded over the period 1981 through 1993. A forecasting model is developed using historical and publicly available information to predict futures closing prices for these contracts, then two trading rules (a confidence interval and a percentage price change filter) are used to determine their profit potentials. The size of profits generated from trading canola futures under either rule during the period 1987–1993 is consistent with C. Carter's (1989) earlier results that no market inefficiency was detected during the 1980–1987 period. Similarly, profits from the Canadian feed wheat thinly traded contracts and from a control group using the highly-liquid American soybean oil and wheat contracts do not violate the efficiency theory. The average gross profit per trade analysis further suggests that net positive profits may not be viable for marginal investors.     

The asymmetric effects of U.S. large-scale asset purchases on the volatility of the Canadian dollar futures market

This paper investigates the asymmetric effects of U.S. large-scale asset purchases on the volatility of the Canadian dollar futures market. This approach is innovative in so far as it examines the effects of allowing two-round impacts to differ in our settings of dynamic volatility with time-varying jump intensity because the world economic situation differs during periods of large-scale asset purchases. Utilizing the daily futures price of the exchange rate for the Canadian dollar against the U.S. dollar, the empirical findings show that U.S. large-scale asset purchases have significant asymmetric effects on the volatility of the Canadian dollar futures market. Two kinds of asymmetry are observed. Firstly, the impact of large-scale asset purchases is smaller in the first round of the large-scale asset purchases than in the second round. Secondly, an expansionary policy causes higher volatility in the Canadian dollar futures market than does a contractionary policy due to a signal of high liquidity.     

Asymmetric determinants of corporate bond credit spreads in China: Evidence from a nonlinear ARDL model

This study utilizes the nonlinear ARDL (NARDL) model proposed by Shin, Yu, and Greenwood-Nimmo (2014) to quantify the potentially asymmetric transmission of positive and negative changes in each of the possible determinants of industry-level corporate bond credit spreads in China. The determinants we consider include the corresponding industry stock price, China’s stock market volatility, the level and slope of the yield curve (i.e., the interest rate), the industrial production growth rate, and the inflation rate. The empirical results suggest substantial asymmetric effects of these determinants on credit spreads, with the positive changes in the determinants showing larger impacts than the negative changes for most industries we consider. Moreover, the corresponding industry stock prices, the interest rate, and the industrial production growth rate negatively drive the industry credit spreads for many industries. In turn, China’s stock market volatility and the inflation rate positively affect the credit spreads at each industry level. These findings may be helpful to investors, bond issuers and policymakers in understanding the dynamics of credit risks and corporate bond rates at the industry level.