Limits to Arbitrage and Value Investing: Evidence From Brazil

ABSTRACT

In this article we show that the results obtained by accounting-based fundamental analysis strategies observed in the US market cannot be directly extended to emerging markets with less developed institutional environments and narrow equity markets as found in Latin America. We use Brazil as a special case and through standard tests show the apparent usefulness of financial statement analysis as an effective investment tool. We show that an investor could have changed his/her high book-to-market (HBM) portfolio one-year (two years) market-adjusted returns from 5.7% (42.4%) to 26.7% (120.2%) by selecting financially strong HBM firms listed on the São Paulo Stock Exchange. Our tests were performed using stock returns from 1995 to 2007 and financial and accounting data from 1994 to 2004. When one considers low book-to-market (LBM) firms, the results of the study indicate that an investor could change his/her mean (median) one-year market adjusted return from ?11.9% (?7.4%) to 8.1% (2.5%) by adopting the strategy proposed. However, additional investigation demonstrates that the returns generated by these strategies are significantly dependent on stock's liquidity, and when we consider only stocks where arbitrage is possible, the previous results do not hold. These findings contribute to the literature that tries to address the impact of limits to arbitrage on some well reported capital markets phenomena related to financial reporting.     

Financial liberalisation and sustained interest differentials

In the last decade, many of the more advanced developing countries in Latin America and Asia have deregulated and opened up their financial markets. What impact has this had on the efficiency of the financial sector? How can the existence of sustained interest differentials be explained?     

银行信贷和资产价格泡沫的联动性——基于动态贷款价值比的分析

投资者借贷投资是现代金融市场的常态。信息不对称及其带来的风险收益不对称和风险转移问题,会造成资产价格泡沫。文章引入贷款价值比进一步扩展了Allen-Gale模型,并用贷款价值比的动态变化来说明资产价格泡沫生成的内在机理及其所产生的影响;通过对贷款价值比动态调整的模拟得出:贷款价值比越大,资产价格泡沫越大。因此,降低贷款价值比是遏制资产价格泡沫膨胀的关键。     

The valuation of closely-held companies in Latin America

M&A activity has greatly increased in Latin America in the recent past. As a result, the improvement of valuation techniques has gained a prominent place in the agenda of investors and financial analysts dealing with the region. The task entails two substantial challenges, however. First, fundamental valuation requires the determination of an appropriate cost of capital, and the traditional CAPM-based models which are normally used to compute it are difficult to apply in such transitional, less efficient markets. Second, most companies and transactions in Latin America are closely-held operations, and hence bear components of unsystematic risk which classical appraisal techniques do not easily capture. In this paper, we develop a comprehensive fundamentals-based valuation model and provide supporting empirical data for valuing privately-held companies in Latin American emerging markets.     

Rational speculative bubbles in the gold futures market: An application of dynamic factor analysis

The existence of speculative bubbles in financial markets has been a longstanding issue under debate. Many financial economists believe that, given the assumption of rational expectations and rational behavior of economic agents, an asset should be priced according to its “market fundamentals.” Others argue that self‐fulfilling rumors of market participants can influence asset prices as well. These self‐fulfilling rumors are initiated by events extraneous to markets and are often called bubbles. The rationality of both expectations and behavior often does not imply that the price of an asset be equal to its fundamental value. In other words, there can be rational deviations of the price from this value—rational bubbles. A rational bubble can arise when the actual market price depends positively on its own expected rate of change, as normally occurs in asset markets. Since agents forming rational expectations do not make systematic prediction errors, the positive relationship between price and its expected rate of change implies a similar relationship between price and its actual rate of change. Under such conditions, the arbitrary, self‐fulfilling expectation of price changes may drive actual price changes independently of market fundamentals; we refer to such a situation as a rational price bubble.¹ © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 21:79–108, 2001     

Adspend in the Americas—a tale of two regions

The advertising markets of North and Latin America are very different. North America, dominated by the US, is a region of mature markets and low growth, and a well-balanced media mix. In contrast, Latin America generally consists of under-developed markets that have experienced very high growth rates in recent years, with most investment going to television.     

Mexican peso crisis and its spillover effects to emerging market debt

This paper examines the spillover effects of the Mexican financial crisis to emerging financial markets. As of November 1994, the financial markets were not anticipating a change in exchange rate regime in Mexico. Coincident with the peso devaluation on 20, December 1994, Mexican Brady bond prices declined significantly and continued to experience significant decline during the subsequent three months. Emerging market assets reacted differently to the Mexican crisis. Latin America as a region was more exposed to the Mexican crisis than emerging markets from other regions. The ratio of liquid monetary assets to international reserves and the ratio of current account to GDP were the most influential variables in explaining variation in CARs across countries. Trade competition with third markets was the most significant transmission channel during the Mexican crisis.     

Dependence dynamics of stock markets during COVID-19

Stock markets have exhibited increased returns connectedness during the COVID-19 period. We examine the returns dependence among 42 stock markets classified under various emerging and developed groupings. We apply several dependence measures to examine the returns connectedness among the markets. Our results show that stock markets from the G-7 and Emerging Frontier and Asian (EFA) region exhibit high connectedness with other international markets, while Middle East and North African (MENA) and Latin American (LA) stock markets offer high diversification opportunities through low returns connectedness. The returns coherence of Central and East European (CEE) and G-7 markets increase significantly during the COVID-19 period which supports the hypothesis of contagion. However, during the pandemic MENA stock markets (excluding Greece) and most EFA markets (excluding China, Singapore and Korea) remain less cointegrated with other international equity markets. Our results have implications for individual and institutional investors, fund managers and other financial market stakeholders.     

Sustainable banking in Latin American developing countries: Leading to (mutual) prosperity

This article examines multinational banks’ (MNBs) approaches to corporate social responsibility (CSR) in developing countries’ subsidiaries, particularly in Latin America. Building on in-depth case studies of two MNBs that are based in Europe and market leaders in Latin America, we analyze their CSR motivations and outcomes in host countries. We examine institutional environments by applying the national business system framework, and we suggest missing categories in its financial and educational dimensions. We theorize how institutional necessity determines MNBs' CSR in developing countries. Finally, we examine the CSR outcomes in Latin America, where banks’ responsible conduct has led to major improvements in educational levels and financial inclusion. These improvements alleviate poverty and enhance both country's social wellbeing and MNBs’ legitimacy, leading to mutual prosperity.     

Internet-based corporate disclosure and market value: Evidence from Latin America

We examine the relationship between an Internet-based corporate disclosure index and firm value in the seven largest stock markets of Latin America. We find, after controlling for firms' characteristics, industry and country of origin, that an increase of 1% in the Internet-Based Corporate Disclosure Index causes an increase of 0.1592% in the Tobin's Q and an increase of 0.0119% in the firm's ROA. These findings are robust after considering the potential endogeneity of our regression variables. The evidence contributes to the literature suggesting that firms can differentiate themselves by self-adopting better financial and corporate disclosure measures using the Internet.     

International capital flows,returns and world financial integration

International capital flows have increased dramatically since the 1980s, with much of the increase being due to trade in equity and bond markets. Such developments are often attributed to the increased integration of world financial markets. We present a model that allows us to examine how greater integration in world financial markets affects the behavior of international capital flows and financial returns. Our model predicts that international capital flows are large (in absolute value) and very volatile during the early stages of financial integration when international asset trading is concentrated in bonds. As integration progresses and households gain access to world equity markets, the size and volatility of international bond flows decline. This is the natural outcome of greater risk sharing facilitated by increased integration. This pattern is consistent with declining volatility observed during 1975–2007 period in the G-7 countries. We also find that the equilibrium flows in bonds and stocks predicted by the model are larger than their empirical counterparts, and are largely driven by variations in equity risk premia. The model also predicts that volatility of equity and bond returns decline with integration, again consistent with the data for G-7 economies.     

On the stability of domestic financial market linkages in the presence of time-varying volatility

We analyze the stability of domestic financial linkages between periods of calm and turbulent market conditions. Our model develops a simultaneous test of shift contagion and bi-directional pure contagion, which is applied to the equity and currency markets of a group of East Asian emerging economies. Our results show a great deal of instability in these markets with widespread evidence of pure contagion in both directions. There is less evidence of shift contagion with the transmission of common shocks unchanged between regimes for the majority of countries.     

Second Generation Electricity Reforms in Latin America and the California Paradigm

In this paper we discuss second-generation electricity reforms being formulated in Latin America and how they are being reshaped by the California crisis, which had stood as a paradigm, at least in theory, for fully competitive markets. We argue that the main lesson policy makers in Latin America should draw from the experience in California and other electricity markets around the world is that the liberalization of wholesale markets will not result in more competitive outcomes where market concentration is significant, final consumers are isolated from actual marginal production costs and capacity is tight. At least in the case of Argentina and Chile, the California crisis has had a “positive externality” by persuading policy makers, at least momentarily, to postpone liberalization reforms and make them realize the complexities in implementing competitive markets.     

Does socially responsible investment equity indexes in emerging markets pay off? Evidence from Brazil

This paper explores the financial performance of a mainstream socially responsible investment equity index in emerging markets: the Brazilian Corporate Sustainability Index. The results indicate that investors in emerging markets could accommodate their ethical values while at the same time not scarifying their overall portfolio performance in bullish market periods. However, the financial crisis led ethical investors to take a riskier and less profitable portfolio. These results seem to be due to socially responsible investment in Brazil that, as with other emerging markets, is highly influenced by social and institutional factors.     

Currency trading and international financial instability

During the past year, global capital markets have experienced an unprecedented series of financial turmoils. Asian contagion, Russia's default and the collapse of the US hedge fund Long Term Capital Management (LTCM) are the low points of this development. As recent events in Latin America and elsewhere indicate, there is no prospect that markets worldwide will lastingly calm down soon. There is an abundance of proposals and suggestions on how the system should be stabilised. The most popular among them include the control of capital flows and hedge-fund activities. The following article draws attention to another element of financial instability which at times triggers, at times fuels, a crisis: expectation-driven foreign exchange transactions.     

Unilever's Latin American Strategy in Yellow Fats,Ice Cream and Teas

Abstract

The article investigates the interplay between the changes in the large corporate strategy of a multinational and changes in the business environment in Latin America. In its international expansion, Unilever has traditionally used a decentralized national responsive strategy where local subsidiaries develop their markets with a great degree of autonomy. In response to globalization, Unilever moved towards greater business coordination and a more focused approach in the nineties. The article examines the impact of this reorganization on the firm's regional strategy in Latin America. We examine the firm's strategy in three food categories: fat oils, ice cream and tea-based products. We conclude that Unilever continues to use a strategy of national responsiveness with no attempt to coordinate its experiences across the region.     

Tapering talk: The impact of expectations of reduced Federal Reserve security purchases on emerging markets

In May 2013, Federal Reserve officials first began to talk of the possibility of tapering their security purchases. This “tapering talk” had a large negative impact on the exchange rate and financial markets in emerging markets. In this paper, we analyze who was hit and why. We find that countries with larger and more liquid markets and larger inflows of capital in prior years experienced more pressure on their exchange rate, foreign reserves, and equity prices. We interpret this as investors being able to rebalance their portfolios more easily when the target country has a large and liquid financial market.     

Emerging Securities Exchanges in Africa

ABSTRACT

African securities markets have not received the academic attention of those in Latin America and Southeast Asia. Historically, capital markets have not played a significant role in financing the development of the African economy. Today, however, African governments are focusing on the importance of moving toward more market-oriented economies and developing the financial market infrastructure to mobilize funds from both the private and public sectors. This paper describes the institutional characteristics of a newly revitalized stock exchange in Nairobi, Kenya. The study concludes that historical and cultural factors play a significant role in the characteristics of the Nairobi Stock Exchange.     

Foreign shocks and international cost of equity destabilization. Evidence from the MENA region

This paper investigates whether foreign financial shocks can destabilize the cost of equity in emerging markets. After a theoretical discussion, we develop annual metrics for the international cost of equity, financial integration, spillovers and shift-contagion vulnerability in a sample of 535 Middle East and North African firms from Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco and Jordan over the 1998–2011 period. We then analyze the impact of foreign shocks on the international cost of equity, using a set of SGMM and PVAR models. Our results indicate that external shocks can increase the cost of equity in mature emerging markets.