Do Japanese candlesticks help solve the trader’s dilemma?

In this paper, we investigate whether Japanese candlesticks can help traders to find the best trade-off between market timing and market impact costs. Based on fixed-effect panel regressions on a sample of 81 European stocks, we show that implicit transaction costs are better characterized by using specific Japanese candlesticks patterns. Although market timing costs are not lower when Hammer-like and Doji configurations occur, market impact costs are significantly lower when and after a Doji structure occurs. We further check the potential gains through order submission simulations and find that submission strategies based on the occurrence of Doji result in significantly lower market impact cost than random submission strategies. These findings are of great interest for investors who look for occasional liquidity pools to execute their orders inexpensively such as institutional traders or hedgers.     

Equity issues and aggregate market returns under information asymmetry

We propose a simple time-series model based on information asymmetry that allows us to test the predictive power of equity and debt issues with respect to future market returns. Using this method, we find that managers’ new equity and debt issue decisions have predictive power for future market returns, when we take into account potential feedback from past market returns and structural breaks. We also take into account a cointegration relation among stock prices, equity issues and debt issues. This finding is robust with respect to various measures of market returns and consistent with the managerial timing hypothesis.     

Why is timing perverse?

The existence of negative market timing, even for passive portfolios, poses a relevant puzzle when assessing portfolio management. In this paper, we develop a simple theoretical model so as to explain why such perverse market timing might occur and why those stocks with the lowest beta in upward markets exhibit pronounced negative timing. Our explanation is based on the existence of higher correlations of stocks in down markets than in up markets. We find that changes in beta, which drives timing, has four components; however, just two of these, mean covariance shift and covariances dispersion map, serve to explain the asymmetric behavior across stocks. We find that a high percentage of the negative market timing ability identified for mutual funds in the literature could be explained by this bias.     

The second moment matters! Cross-sectional dispersion of firm valuations and expected returns

Behavioral theories predict that firm valuation dispersion in the cross-section (“dispersion”) measures aggregate overpricing caused by investor overconfidence and should be negatively related to expected aggregate returns. This paper develops and tests these hypotheses. Consistent with the model predictions, I find that measures of dispersion are positively related to aggregate valuations, trading volume, idiosyncratic volatility, past market returns, and current and future investor sentiment indexes. Dispersion is a strong negative predictor of subsequent short- and long-term market excess returns. Market beta is positively related to stock returns when the beginning-of-period dispersion is low and this relationship reverses when initial dispersion is high. A simple forecast model based on dispersion significantly outperforms a naive model based on historical equity premium in out-of-sample tests and the predictability is stronger in economic downturns.     

Market efficiency during the global financial crisis: Empirical evidence from European banks

This paper empirically investigates the asymmetric effect of news on the time-varying beta of selected banks from seven European countries during the current crisis period and also during the pre-crisis period. The paper applies daily data from thirteen large banks from France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain. The sample size ranges from 2002 to 2013 and includes the current global financial crisis (2007–2013). The BEKK GARCH model is first employed to estimate the time-varying beta and then linear regression is applied to investigate the asymmetric effect of news on the beta. The asymmetric effects are investigated based on both market and non-market shocks. Results show that some evidence of market efficiency can be witnessed via non-market shocks, however the market shocks indicate that the European banks foster a significant amount of uncertainty leading to asset mispricing. Results also show a clear rift in terms of quality of results between France and Germany taken as a group and the rest of the countries under study. These results shed light on the level of market efficiency and hedging strategies.     

The predictability of real estate returns and market timing

Recent evidence suggests that all asset returns are predictable to some extent with excess returns on real estate relatively easier to forecast. This raises the issue of whether we can successfully exploit this level of predictability using various market timing strategies to realize superior performance over a buy-and-hold strategy. We find that the level of predicability associated with real estate leads to moderate success in market timing, although this is not necessarily the case for the other asset classes examined in general. Besides this, real estate stocks typically have higher trading profits and higher mean risk-adjusted excess returns when compared to small stocks as well as large stocks and bonds even though most real estate stocks are small stocks.     

Corporate governance and stock returns in Asia

Despite years of study, the impact of firm-level governance on stock returns is not clear, especially in non-U.S. markets. We investigate the returns of governance-based trading strategies in Asia, using bias-free return data and CLSA governance ratings. We argue that poor governance should be associated with higher market risk. We find that a portfolio of poorly governed firms has a higher market beta, higher expected return and higher realized return, compared with a good governance portfolio. In contrast to some earlier studies, we find no abnormal returns after adjusting for risk and country effects. Only investors who can predict in advance which firms will improve their governance can earn abnormal returns.     

我国股票市场发展对银行间市场的影响

股票市场和银行间市场是我国金融市场中两个主要的子市场,随着金融市场发展和创新步伐加快,两者之间的关系日益密切。在近年来我国股票市场快速发展的背景下,研究股票市场发展对银行间市场的影响,有助于理顺和改进我国股票市场与银行间市场相互间的关系,促进两个市场协调健康发展。     

Pricing credit default swaps with bilateral value adjustments

The aim of this work is to examine the influence of mutual fund flows on market timing models, thus providing unbiased timing coefficients. However, as this control is motivated by the existing relationship between mutual fund flows and market returns, we first analyse this relationship, considering previous and concurrent market returns. However, unlike existing studies, we do not consider future returns, since investors do not observe them when making investment decisions. Thus, we feel it is more appropriate to consider expected market returns. We construct the expected market returns by running an AR model and considering the available public information about the macro-economy. The relationship is analysed under different conditions, considering a variety of different mutual fund flow measures, and considering (or not) the sensitivity of mutual fund flows to positive and negative market returns. We also propose different controls for the traditional timing models, and we further analyse the reverse-causality problem. The study demonstrates, for a sample of equity mutual funds registered for sale in the USA, that the poor market timing performance found in this and other prior studies can be completely attributed to the perverse effect of the fund managers’ liquidity service.     

Understanding industry betas

This paper models and explains the dynamics of market betas for 30 US industry portfolios between 1970 and 2009. We use DCC–MIDAS and kernel regression techniques as alternatives to the standard ex-post measures. We find betas to exhibit substantial persistence, time variation, ranking variability, and heterogeneity in their business cycle exposure. While we find only a limited amount of structural breaks in the betas of individual industries, we do identify a common structural break in March 1998. We propose two practical applications to understand the economic significance of these results. We find the cross-sectional dispersion in industry betas to be countercyclical and negatively related to future market returns. We also find DCC–MIDAS betas to outperform other beta measures in terms of limiting the downside risk and ex-post market exposure of a market-neutral minimum-variance strategy.     

Low-latency trading

We define low-latency activity as strategies that respond to market events in the millisecond environment, the hallmark of proprietary trading by high-frequency traders though it could include other algorithmic activity as well. We propose a new measure of low-latency activity to investigate the impact of high-frequency trading on the market environment. Our measure is highly correlated with NASDAQ-constructed estimates of high-frequency trading, but it can be computed from widely-available message data. We use this measure to study how low-latency activity affects market quality both during normal market conditions and during a period of declining prices and heightened economic uncertainty. Our analysis suggests that increased low-latency activity improves traditional market quality measures—decreasing spreads, increasing displayed depth in the limit order book, and lowering short-term volatility. Our findings suggest that given the current market structure for U.S. equities, increased low-latency activity need not work to the detriment of long-term investors.     

The impact of culture on market timing in capital structure choices

This study uses Hofstede's (2001) cultural dimensions to investigate the impact of market reception on capital structure. We examine the interaction of these dimensions with stock returns, our proxy for market timing. Based on our market leverage results, we find evidence that firms do engage in market timing by reducing their leverage ratios when their share prices increase. Furthermore, we find that firms in countries with high uncertainty avoidance and high power distance have lower market leverage ratios and that these cultural dimensions serve to reduce the impact of market timing. These results are consistent for developed markets but mixed for emerging markets. On a book leverage basis, the results are generally consistent but less conclusive. To the extent that culture impacts manager perception of risk and investor reception of newly issued shares, we conclude that cultural dimensions impact the degree to which a firm can modify its capital structure to take advantage of perceived market mispricings.     

市场时机对我国上市公司并购融资行为的影响

全流通格局开启了我国上市公司并购融资多元化的时代。在国内研究中,鲜有基于股权分置改革来研究市场时机对我国上市公司并购融资行为的影响。因此,本文以外部融资加权平均市账比作为市场时机的代理变量,通过建立Tobit模型进行实证检验与分析,发现在股票市场全流通的背景下,市场时机对上市公司并购融资行为具有显著的影响,但这种影响持续性很短,大约为3年。同时检验结果表明,市场时机、盈利能力对公司债务杠杆的影响在长期内会发生逆转。     

The Implications of Dispersion in Analysts' Earnings Forecasts for Future ROE and Future Returns

Dispersion in analysts' forecasts is empirically evaluated by associating dispersion with a firm's future accounting rate of return-on-equity (ROE) and future returns. Forecast dispersion is significantly and negatively associated with future ROE, consistent with the notion that firm disclosures and analysts' information acquisition efforts increase as firm prospects improve. Forecast dispersion is negatively associated with future returns. This appears due to the implications of dispersion for future ROE, and suggests that the market does not immediately assimilate the information contained in forecast dispersion. Dispersion also conveys information about firm-specific risk not captured by beta and firm size.     

Corporate financing decisions, managerial market timing, and real investment

Both market timing and investment-based theories of corporate financing predict under-performance after firms raise capital, but only market timing predicts that the composition of financing (equity compared with debt) should also forecast returns. In cross-sectional tests, we find that the amount of net financing is more important than its composition in explaining future stock returns. In the time series, investment-based factor models explain abnormal stock performance following a variety of corporate financing events that previous studies link to market timing. At the aggregate level, the amount of new financing is also more important for future market returns than its composition. Overall, our joint tests reveal that measures of real investment are correlated with future returns and measures of managerial market timing are not.     

Is competition beneficial? The case of exchange traded funds

New ETF creation has surged in recent years, giving investors the option to choose from a wide range of similar ETFs within each group of competitors. We identify groups of ETFs that can be considered direct competitors and examine the impact of competition on their market quality. Results show improved market quality measures when competition increases. A change equivalent to going from a monopoly to a highly competitive market results in a 29% decrease in bid–ask spreads, a 72% decrease in illiquidity, and a 52% increase in turnover. However, we find that competition has a differential impact on ETFs according to their market depth. Market quality improves with competition for large or well-performing ETFs, while it worsens for small or under-performing ETFs. A case study on ETFs banned by the SEC in March 2010 further highlights our results in the artificially controlled competitive environment of the moratorium.     

SELECTIVITY,MARKET TIMING,AND RANDOM BETA BEHAVIOR OF MUTUAL FUNDS: A GENERALIZED MODEL

This paper presents a generalized varying parameter model to investigate the performance of mutual funds. The model allows beta nonstationarity to include both market timing and random beta behavior; therefore, it can be regarded as a general case of previous research. Forty-three funds with a wide range of objectives are examined. The generalized varying parameter results indicate that about 30 percent of the funds show selectivity, 19 percent have random betas, and 14 percent indicate significant, yet negative, market timing performance. Therefore, mutual funds, as a group, show no market timing ability. The apparent ability to select undervalued securities, however, seems to conflict with the efficient markets hypothesis.     

Derivative use,fund flows and investment manager performance

Prior literature which examines the use of derivatives by investment managers does not discern between different types of derivative trading strategies. This study is the first to examine and gather data on a particular type of derivative trading strategy undertaken by investment managers. We examine the extent to which equity fund managers use index futures to manage fund flows and the effect this has on their alpha and market timing measures of performance. Our results show that funds that do not use derivatives exhibit lower returns and negative market timing skills when they experience fund flow. The performance of funds that use derivatives, however, is independent of investor’s liquidity demands. In fact, the unconditional performance of the average user fund is statistically equivalent to the performance of the average non-user fund conditional on zero fund flow. Our results provide evidence that derivatives can be beneficial for mutual fund holders under certain conditions.     

Labor cost voluntary disclosures and firm equity values: Is human capital information value-relevant?

This study examines the market value relevance of labor cost voluntary disclosures using a valuation model relating firm market values to book values of equity and to disclosed human capital information, such as labor costs, net pension liabilities (NPLs), and estimated average and marginal labor productivity and efficiency indicators. Results indicate that labor cost disclosing companies command higher equity market values in general, and that labor productivity and efficiency measures appear to be undervalued. Both findings suggest that there might be market opportunities for firms with valuable human capital to differentiate themselves from their industry peers, which might encourage further human capital disclosure in the future. More refined measures of human capital assets and investments are needed to assess firms’ human resource management decisions and performance impacts in the capital markets more adequately.     

近年来我国市场非总均衡态势变化及其成因分析

实现市场总均衡是宏观调控的基本目标.而我国市场长期处于非均衡状态.本文分析了1998-2002年和2003年至今两个阶段的市场非总均衡态势及其成因,研究前一个阶段意在为分析当前的结构性非均衡市场提供历史参考,进一步剖析我国市场运行及经济运行中存在的深层次矛盾--生产和消费之间的矛盾,提出使非总均衡向总均衡转化的途径和手段.