Impact of the introduction of call auction on price discovery: Evidence from the Indian stock market using high-frequency data

Call markets are claimed to aggregate information and facilitate price discovery where continuous markets may fail. The impact of the introduction of call auction has not been found uniformly beneficial, possibly due to poor design or due to ‘thick market externalities’. This paper examines the reintroduction of opening call auction at the National Stock Exchange of India in 2010. The results suggest that the auctions attract very little volume, the intraday pattern of volume and volatility in the continuous market remains unchanged and a large fraction of price discovery, measured by the Weighted Price Contribution, still takes place in the first 15 min of continuous market. However, the market synchronicity has improved after the introduction of the auction. Our findings suggest that the ability to attract volume in the call auction for effective price discovery depends on the institutional settings and the characteristics of liquidity supply in the market.     

Not all call auctions are created equal: evidence from Hong Kong

On 25 March 2002, the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Ltd (HKEx) introduced an opening call auction. This trading mechanism is designed to facilitate price discovery in the presence of asymmetric information at the market open, increasing opening price efficiency. The design of the HKEx differs significantly from opening auctions in other markets. Contrary to previous research, the results indicate a decrease in market quality following the introduction of the opening call auction. This decline is largest in the less actively traded stocks.

A comparison of trading and non-trading mechanisms for price discovery

This paper compares trading and non-trading mechanisms for price discovery during the Nasdaq pre-open and examines whether prices discovered though non-trading mechanisms are less efficient or reveal less information than prices discovered through trading. As Nasdaq pre-open trading volume increased, the opening price became more efficient and price discovery shifted from the opening trade to the pre-open. Price discovery shifted from the trading day to the pre-open only for the highest-volume stocks. These results suggest that pre-open trading contributes to the efficiency of the opening price, but that a critical threshold of trading volume is required to increase the amount of information in the opening price.     

Are CDS Auctions Biased and Inefficient?

We study the design of credit default swaps (CDS) auctions, which determine the payments by CDS sellers to CDS buyers following defaults of bonds. Using a simple model, we find that the current design of CDS auctions leads to biased prices and inefficient allocations. This is because various restrictions imposed in CDS auctions prevent certain investors from participating in the price discovery and allocation process. The imposition of a price cap or floor also gives dealers large influence on the final auction price. We propose an alternative double auction design that delivers more efficient price discovery and allocations.     

Price Discovery in the Treasury‐Bill When‐Issued Market

When‐issued (i.e., forward) trading in T‐bills yet to be auctioned provides a unique environment for examining price discovery. Because T‐bills are auctioned in a sealed‐bid process, when‐issued traders cannot observe the spot market price. Yet the forward price must ultimately converge on the auction outcome price. Our results indicate that traders in the when‐issued market “discover” the ultimate auction price. Little evidence is found that standard order flow variables contribute to price discovery. Instead, the ability to observe a few trades with relatively small volume in the when‐issued market is sufficient to discover the auction price resulting from the sealed‐bid process.     

How does the call market method affect price efficiency? Evidence from the Singapore Stock Market

On August 21, 2000, the Singapore Exchange (SGX) adopted the call market method to open and close the market while the remainder of the day’s trading continued to rely on the continuous auction method. The call method significantly improved the price discovery process and market quality. A positive spillover effect is observed from the opening and closing calls. Day-end price manipulation also declined after the introduction of the call market method. However, the beneficial impact from the call market method is asymmetric, benefiting liquid stocks more than illiquid stocks.     

Do Unexpected Land Auction Outcomes Bring New Information to the Real Estate Market?

Land and real estate are intrinsically related but generally traded in two different markets. Vacant land, being a major “raw material” for development of real estate, is traded by developers who actively manage development risk for profit. Real estate, being a long lived final product, is traded by end-users or investors for use or investment in the secondary market. This study examines price discovery between the two markets. The key question is whether land transactions, in the form of public auctions, convey any new information to the secondary real estate market. Our results suggest unexpected land auction outcomes have both market-wide and local effects on real estate prices. However, the impacts are asymmetric. We found that lower than expected land auction prices have a significant negative market-wide and local impact on real estate prices while higher than expect land auction prices have little or no impact.     

The Effects of Trading Methods on Volatility and Liquidity: Evidence from the Taiwan Stock Exchange

This study contrasts the call and continuous auction methods using Taiwan Stock Exchange data. Volatility under the call market method is approximately one-half of that under the continuous auction method. The call market method is more effective in reducing the volatility of high-volume stocks than low-volume stocks. This contradicts conventional wisdom which suggests that the call market method is superior for thinly traded stocks, while the continuous auction method is preferred for heavily traded stocks. The call market method does not impair liquidity and price discovery. The call market appears more efficient than in the continuous auction market.     

RULE CHANGES AND UNCERTAINTY IN DISCRIMINATORY AND UNIFORM PRICE AUCTIONS

The auction literature indicates that uncertainty about the value of auctioned goods increases underpricing in discriminatory price auctions. Such uncertainty has a smaller effect on uniform price auctions because the pricing rule aggregates bidders' information. We find that uncertainty resulting from inexperience with an auction mechanism has similar effects. Using initial public offering (IPO) data from Japan and Israel, we find that average underpricing increases temporarily in Japan's discriminatory price auctions after changes in the auction rules, which suggests that bidders reduce their bids in response to uncertainty. Underpricing in Israel's uniform price auctions is not affected by rule changes.     

Regulating bidder participation in auctions

Regulating bidder participation in auctions can potentially increase efficiency compared to standard auction formats with free entry. We show that the relative performance of two such mechanisms, a standard first‐price auction with free entry and an entry rights auction, depends nonmonotonically on the precision of information that bidders have about their costs prior to deciding whether to participate in a mechanism. As an empirical application, we estimate parameters from first‐price auctions with free entry for bridge‐building contracts in Oklahoma and Texas and predict that an entry rights auction increases efficiency and reduces procurement costs significantly.     

Stock Price Behavior over Trading and Non-trading Periods: Evidence from the Taiwan Stock Exchange

This paper examines the stock price behavior in the trading and non-trading periods for stocks listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange over 1971-96. The results indicate that the trading-time return variances are higher than the non-trading-time return variances especially for the larger trading-volume quintiles. This result is consistent with the private information hypothesis. Moreover, open-to-open return variances are higher than close-to-close return variances. Since both the opening and the closing transactions are conducted by the call auction procedure, the results are consistent with the trading halt hypothesis but not with the trading mechanism hypothesis.     

Excess demand and price formation during a Walrasian auction

We conduct a detailed analysis of the relationship between excess demand and the convergence of price to equilibrium during a real-world Walrasian auction, paying special attention to the size and speed of the price adjustment. Using data from the Tokyo Grain Exchange (TGE), we first show that because auctions for the various futures contracts occur sequentially, information becomes more evenly dispersed across traders as an auction sequence progresses. Then we show that excess demand is positively correlated with both the eventual price change and the speed with which price adjusts. As information becomes more evenly dispersed, the strength of these relationships weakens. Finally, though excess demand explains a large proportion of the variability of the change in price, it explains only a small proportion of the variability of the speed of adjustment.     

The effects of randomizing the opening time on the performance of a stock market under stress

To tackle challenges from derivatives trading and illiquidity, reduce manipulation and improve price discovery, many exchanges have started opening at random times. We investigate how randomization has affected the performance of the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange at trade opening and at the expiration of stock-index derivatives. Randomization has improved price discovery and reduced excess volatility and price distortion, especially on expiration dates. Although preopening prices do not converge to full information values, post-randomization, opening prices on expiration days are at least as accurate as on other days. Spot market trading systems significantly impact the effects of derivatives on spot prices.     

Price Discovery without Trading: Evidence from Limit Orders

We analyze the contribution to price discovery of market and limit orders by high‐frequency traders (HFTs) and non‐HFTs. While market orders have a larger individual price impact, limit orders are far more numerous. This results in price discovery occurring predominantly through limit orders. HFTs submit the bulk of limit orders and these limit orders provide most of the price discovery. Submissions of limit orders and their contribution to price discovery fall with volatility due to changes in HFTs’ behavior. Consistent with adverse selection arising from faster reactions to public information, HFTs’ informational advantage is partially explained by public information.     

Adverse Information and Dealer Spreads: Evidence from Dutch Auction Repurchases

The Dutch auction repurchase has become an increasingly popular alternative to open market repurchases and self-tender offers for the distribution of earnings to shareholders. In a Dutch auction, the repurchase price is not determined by a managerial decision, but by shareholders. The extent to which a Dutch auction signals private information is tested by examining stock returns and bid-ask spreads. Stock prices increase and bid-ask spreads widen during the announcement of a Dutch auction; prices decrease and spreads narrow at expiration. Because of the uncertainty surrounding the final repurchase price, Dutch auctions initially increase the risk to which security dealers are exposed. As information asymmetry among managers, investors, and dealers is reduced at expiration, security dealers no longer need to protect themselves from information trades.     

Bidding into the Red: A Model of Post-Auction Bankruptcy

This paper investigates auctions where bidders have limited liability. First, we analyze bidding behavior under different auction formats, showing that the second‐price auction induces higher prices, higher bankruptcy rates, and lower utilities than the first‐price auction. Second, we show that the cost of bankruptcy critically affects the seller's preference over the choice of auction. If bankruptcy is very costly, the seller prefers the first‐price auction over the second‐price auction. Alternatively, if the bankrupt assets are resold among the losers of the initial auction, the seller prefers the second‐price auction.     

Price Discovery without Trading: Evidence from the Nasdaq Preopening

This paper studies Nasdaq market makers' activities during the one and one-half hour preopening period. Price discovery during the preopening is conducted via price signaling as opposed to the auction used to open the NYSE or the continuous market used during trading. In the absence of trades, Nasdaq dealers use crossed and locked inside quotes to signal to other market makers which direction the price should move. Furthermore, we find evidence of price leadership among market makers that bears little resemblance to their IPO\SEO lead underwriter participation.     

Overnight public information,order placement,and price discovery during the pre-opening period

This study examines the impact of corporate news announcements released overnight on price discovery during the pre-opening period in the Australian Securities Exchange. Our results suggest that the presence of these announcements increases the efficiency of indicative opening prices and that the intensity of these announcements significantly influences the aggressiveness of pre-opening orders. Using earnings announcements to compare the speed of price adjustments in response to overnight and daytime information of a homogeneous type, we find that prices respond immediately to overnight news upon the commencement of trading, whereas adjustments based on trading-hours news tend not to be instantaneous. Overall, our evidence highlights the important role of the pre-opening period in price discovery and the prospect of further enhancing this role by timing the release of public information to occur during non-trading hours.     

What do price discovery metrics really measure?

A market is typically considered to dominate price discovery if it is the first to reflect new information about the fundamental value. Our simulations indicate that common price discovery metrics – Hasbrouck information share and Harris–McInish–Wood component share – are only consistent with this view of price discovery if the price series have equal levels of noise, including microstructure frictions and liquidity. If the noise in the price series differs, the information and component shares measure a combination of leadership in impounding new information and relative avoidance of noise, to varying degrees. A third price discovery metric, the ‘information leadership share’ uses the information share and the component share together to identify the price series that is first to impound new information. This third metric is robust to differences in noise levels and therefore correctly attributes price discovery in a wider range of settings. Using four recent empirical studies of price discovery we show that the choice and interpretation of price discovery metrics can have a substantial impact on conclusions about price discovery.     

Biased Auctioneers

We construct a neural network algorithm that generates price predictions for art at auction, relying on both visual and nonvisual object characteristics. We find that higher automated valuations relative to auction house presale estimates are associated with substantially higher price-to-estimate ratios and lower buy-in rates, pointing to estimates' informational inefficiency. The relative contribution of machine learning is higher for artists with less dispersed and lower average prices. Furthermore, we show that auctioneers' prediction errors are persistent both at the artist and at the auction house level, and hence directly predictable themselves using information on past errors.