Online Search Frequency,Retail Investor Overreaction,and the Cross-Section of Stock Returns: Evidence from the Chinese Stock Market

I find a strong negative relation between online search frequency and future returns on the Chinese stock market. I suggest that this effect captures retail investor overreaction to unexpected signals, because online search frequency reflects the efforts made by investors to obtain firm-specific knowledge. The effect is particularly strong in stocks with high information uncertainty (high analyst dispersion, big past earnings surprises, low analyst coverage, and large trading volume), whose intrinsic values are difficult or costly for investors to estimate. Online search frequency as a direct indicator of retail investors’ reaction to signals also sheds light on the idiosyncratic volatility (IVOL) puzzle. I find that this puzzle is more pronounced in high-search-frequency subsamples and disappears in low-search-frequency subsamples. Further evidence shows that high search frequency strengthens the negative IVOL effect in stocks with positive signals but weakens this effect in stocks with negative signals. I suggest that the IVOL puzzle in the Chinese market can be partially explained as a reversal following overreaction to positive signals by retail investors.     

Arbitrage Asymmetry and the Idiosyncratic Volatility Puzzle

Buying is easier than shorting for many equity investors. Combining this arbitrage asymmetry with the arbitrage risk represented by idiosyncratic volatility (IVOL) explains the negative relation between IVOL and average return. The IVOL‐return relation is negative among overpriced stocks but positive among underpriced stocks, with mispricing determined by combining 11 return anomalies. Consistent with arbitrage asymmetry, the negative relation among overpriced stocks is stronger, especially for stocks less easily shorted, so the overall IVOL‐return relation is negative. Further supporting our explanation, high investor sentiment weakens the positive relation among underpriced stocks and, especially, strengthens the negative relation among overpriced stocks.     

Investor propensity to speculate and price delay in emerging markets

Stocks with lottery-type payoffs exhibit more pronounced price delay. This finding holds for emerging market stocks even when jointly considering the impact of IVOL. In a cross-market analysis, a stronger market-level propensity to speculate, gauging the strength of investor preference for lottery-type payoffs, is found to delay the price reaction to information for stocks in the market in general. These conclusions remain robust when using a random sample that mitigates the bias from unevenly distributed sample observations across markets. Our findings add to the evidence that investors' asset choices that deviate from ideal portfolio diversification influence the process of stock pricing.     

Do Industries Explain Momentum?

This paper documents a strong and prevalent momentum effect in industry components of stock returns which accounts for much of the individual stock momentum anomaly. Specifically, momentum investment strategies, which buy past winning stocks and sell past losing stocks, are significantly less profitable once we control for industry momentum. By contrast, industry momentum investment strategies, which buy stocks from past winning industries and sell stocks from past losing industries, appear highly profitable, even after controlling for size, book-to-market equity, individual stock momentum, the cross-sectional dispersion in mean returns, and potential microstructure influences.     

Mispricing of Research and Development Investments in a Rapidly Emerging and Electronics-Dominated Market

This paper documents prevailing mispricing of research and development (R&D) investments in the Taiwan stock market, a rapidly emerging and electronics-dominated market. Applying stock return data from July 1988 to June 2005, we observe that R&D-intensive stocks tend to outperform stocks with little or no R&D. The R&D-intensity effect cannot be attributed fully to firm size and seasonal effects. The R&D-associated anomaly not only exists but also persists for up to three years. The market apparently undervalues R&D-intensive firms and overvalues non-R&D-intensive firms. Finally, the R&D anomaly is clearer for firms in the electronics industry after 1996.     

中国公募基金挖掘了股票市场异象吗？

公募基金是我国重要的机构投资者之一,分析其投资逻辑对理解机构投资者行为和公募基金的选择至关重要。基于2005年至2019年主动管理偏股型开放式基金数据,本文检验了公募基金对A股市场87个异象因子的挖掘。为解决因子维度过大问题,本文采用非参方法从87个异象因子中提取有效信息的综合指标A-Score,并根据基金持仓构建基金的异象投资指标AIM(Anomalies Investing Measure)。结果显示:(1)中国公募基金挖掘了市场异象;(2)利用AIM可以选择表现更好的基金,并能获得0.45%的月度多空组合收益;(3)基金经理的选股能力、风格选择能力和风控能力是其挖掘异象收益的主要来源;(4)异象挖掘可以为基金带来长期资金流,同时也缓和了市场的错误定价。     

The asset pricing effects of UK market liquidity shocks: Evidence from tick data

Using tick data covering a 12 year period including much of the recent financial crisis we provide an unprecedented examination of the relationship between liquidity and stock returns in the UK market. Previous research on liquidity using high frequency data omits the recent financial crisis and is focused on the US, which has a different market structure to the UK. We first construct several microstructure liquidity measures for FTSE All Share stocks, demonstrating that tick data reveal patterns in intra-day liquidity not observable with lower frequency daily data. Our asymptotic principal component analysis captures commonality in liquidity across stocks to construct systematic market liquidity factors. We find that cross-sectional differences in returns exist across portfolios sorted by liquidity risk. These are strongly robust to market, size and value risk. The inclusion of a momentum factor partially explains some of the liquidity premia but they remain statistically significant. However, during the crisis period a long liquidity risk strategy experiences significantly negative alphas.     

Volatility and covariation of financial assets: A high-frequency analysis

Using high frequency data for the price dynamics of equities we measure the impact that market microstructure noise has on estimates of the: (i) volatility of returns; and (ii) variance–covariance matrix of n assets. We propose a Kalman-filter-based methodology that allows us to deconstruct price series into the true efficient price and the microstructure noise. This approach allows us to employ volatility estimators that achieve very low Root Mean Squared Errors (RMSEs) compared to other estimators that have been proposed to deal with market microstructure noise at high frequencies. Furthermore, this price series decomposition allows us to estimate the variance covariance matrix of n assets in a more efficient way than the methods so far proposed in the literature. We illustrate our results by calculating how microstructure noise affects portfolio decisions and calculations of the equity beta in a CAPM setting.     

Market quality changes in the London Stock Market

This paper examines the impact that the introduction of a closing call auction had on market quality at the London Stock Exchange. Using estimates from the partial adjustment with noise model of Amihud and Mendelson [Amihud, Y., Mendelson, H., 1987. Trading mechanisms and stock returns: An empirical investigation. Journal of Finance 42, 533–553] we show that opening and closing market quality improved for participating stocks. When we stratify our sample securities into five groups based on trading activity we find that the least active securities experience the greatest improvements to market quality. A control sample of stocks are not characterized by discernable changes to market quality.     

Explaining Size Effect for Indian Stock Market

Using data for BSE 500 companies from October 2003 to January 2015, we confirm the presence of strong size effect in Indian stock market. Controlling for penny stocks, we find that returns decrease almost monotonically with firm size. The findings are robust for alternative size measures, i.e. market capitalization, total assets, net fixed assets, net working capital, net sales and enterprise value. We find the presence of non-synchronous trading bias and reverse seasonality effect. It is observed that market, size, value and business cycle factors explain size effect while liquidity and momentum factors have little role in this process. Thus, rational sources explain the size anomaly in the Indian context.     

Order Flow Distribution, Bid–Ask Spreads, and Liquidity Costs: Merrill Lynch's Decision to Cease Routinely Routing Orders to Regional Stock Exchanges

Merrill Lynch's decision to redirect order flow in exchange-listed equity securities from regional exchanges to the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) provides an opportunity to examine (1) whether order flow affects market makers' spread-setting behavior and (2) whether brokers can capture liquidity-cost differences between market centers for their customers. Merrill's market-order customers appear to obtain better prices on the NYSE than on the regionals. Consistently with market microstructure theory, the NYSE's quoted spread for stocks affected by Merrill's decision falls relative to a control sample and decreases absolutely for a subsample of stocks we believe most sensitive to order-flow distribution.Journal of Economic LiteratureClassification Numbers: D40, G10.     

Propensity score matching and abnormal performance after seasoned equity offerings

The long-run underperformance of stocks after seasoned equity offerings (SEOs) is a major challenge to the efficient market hypothesis. We reexamine the SEO underperformance anomaly using the propensity score matching method on a sample of around 2000 offerings between 1986 and 1998. While underperformance characterizes equal-weight and buy-and-hold returns if traditional matching methods are used, the underperformance is economically and statistically insignificant when we match issuers to non-issuers by propensity scores. Our results suggest that SEO underperformance manifests statistical inadequacies of traditional matching methods rather than an anomaly challenging the efficient market hypothesis.     

Does Cross-Listing Really Enhance Market Efficiency for Stocks Listed in the Home Market? The Perspective of Noise Trading in the Chinese Stock Market

The investor recognition hypothesis and the bonding hypothesis, which help us understand the market quality of stocks that are cross-listed on different stock markets, imply improved market efficiency after cross-listing because of increased investor participation. However, the noise trading of inexperienced investors in the Chinese stock market negatively affects market efficiency. By employing propensity score matching and multivariate regression analysis, we show that the increased individual investor participation actually lowers market efficiency in their home market after cross-listing. This effect is more evident for stocks that were either listed first on the Chinese stock market or listed on the Chinese stock market and the Hong Kong stock exchange (SEHK) on the same date than for stocks that were listed first on the SEHK.     

Post earnings announcement drift and the roles of drift-enhanced factors in New Zealand

This study examines the profitability of trading on analyst forecast-based earnings surprises during the post announcement period in the New Zealand stock market over the period 1994 to 2008. The results show that a post earnings announcement drift (PEAD) anomaly exists in the New Zealand equity market. A hedge strategy of going long the top quintile of earnings surprise stocks and short the bottom quintile of earnings surprise stocks can generate more than 6% excess return in the 60 days following the earnings announcement. I further test the association between PEAD and several control variables and find that PEAD is increasing in 1) earnings surprise defined relative to past earnings, and 2) the level of arbitrage risk. Interestingly, I do not find evidence of a positive relation between PEAD and revenue surprise after controlling for earnings surprise as documented in the United States (Jegadeesh and Livnat, 2006). There is also no evidence that the 2002 Disclosure Reform in the New Zealand Stock Exchange reduced the magnitude of PEAD.     

When is a MAX not the MAX? How news resolves information uncertainty

A well-known asset pricing anomaly, the “MAX” effect, measured by the maximum daily return in the past month, depicts stocks’ lottery-like features and investor gambling behaviour. Using the comprehensive stock-level Dow Jones (DJNS) news database between 1979 and 2016, we consider in a empirical setting how the presence of news reports affects these lottery-type stocks. We find an augmented negative relationship between MAX stocks without news and expected returns, whereby MAX with news coverage generates return momentum. The differing future return relationships between MAX stocks with and without news appears to be best explained by information uncertainty mitigation upon news arrival. Overall, our findings suggest that news plays a role in resolving information uncertainty in the stock market.     

Intraday return spillovers and its variations across trading sessions

The main purpose of this paper is to study the intraday return spillovers and their real time variations amongst selected technology stocks. Based upon randomly selected technology stocks in terms of multilateral analysis, we find the following evidence. Firstly, we find that positive spillover effects are discernible amongst medium- and large-sized stocks, with the effects being directionally asymmetric between different size groups. Secondly, we find that for most stocks, the full effects of the firm-specific shocks over other stocks are realized within approximately 30 min to 2 h. Finally, we show that the spillover effects tend to follow an M-shaped intraday pattern. Our results suggest that during the opening and closing sessions, trades motivated by information spilled over from other firms are relatively subordinated, with the trading at these times being largely dominated by those based upon common market factor or firm-specific fundamental information.     

Noise and efficient variance in the Indonesia Stock Exchange

We separate noise from information related variance for stocks traded on the Indonesian Stock Exchange with a realized variance estimator. We find that the average optimal sampling frequency to estimate the realized variance is 9 min and that market quality has improved after 2004. The positive relation between the standard deviation of the noise variance and the square root of the efficient realized variance implies that as uncertainty about asset values increases the risk of transacting with traders with superior information increases as well. Furthermore, variance ratio comparisons reveal that private information is a significant trading component on the IDX.     

证券市场“应计异象”研究：回顾与展望

国际会计准则理事会以及美国财务会计准则委员会都以决策有用性作为会计的首要目标,而会计则是通过权责发生制下的会计应计采实现这一目标的。那么投资者对会计应计的理解就应该成为准则制定的参考因素之一。自从Sloan(1996)在美国市场上发现了投资者高估会计应计的持续性之后,大量的文献时这一现象进行了探讨。本文系统地回顾了这些文献,并对其进行了展望,以便为中国资本市场的应计异象研究以及中国会计准则的制定提供参考。     

Glued to the TV: Distracted Noise Traders and Stock Market Liquidity

In this paper, we study the impact of noise traders’ limited attention on financial markets. Specifically, we exploit episodes of sensational news (exogenous to the market) that distract noise traders. We find that on “distraction days,” trading activity, liquidity, and volatility decrease, and prices reverse less among stocks owned predominantly by noise traders. These outcomes contrast sharply with those due to the inattention of informed speculators and market makers, and are consistent with noise traders mitigating adverse selection risk. We discuss the evolution of these outcomes over time and the role of technological changes.