DAYLIGHT AND INVESTOR SENTIMENT: A SECOND LOOK AT TWO STOCK MARKET BEHAVIORAL ANOMALIES

Kamstra, Kramer, and Levi (2000, 2003) describe two stock market behavioral anomalies associated with changes in investor sentiment caused by daylight saving time (DST) changes and seasonal affective disorder (SAD). According to the hypothesized effects, DST changes and SAD affect asset prices by changing investors’ risk aversion. Although changes in the timing or amount of daylight are correlated with unusual stock market returns, I present evidence they do not cause those unusual returns. Instead, seasonal patterns in market‐related information during the sample period are the likely cause of the correlation between stock market returns and DST changes or SAD.     

Can happiness predict future volatility in stock markets?

In this paper, we use the Twitter based happiness index as a proxy for investor sentiment in order to examine whether happiness influences future market volatility of country VIX indexes. Our sample includes the major stock markets of the USA, Canada, UK, Germany, France, Netherlands, Switzerland, Japan, China, Hong Kong, India, Brazil, South Korea, and South Africa. Using linear and nonlinear causality tests, we find that Twitter happiness significantly causes the future volatility of the sample countries. The robustness checks show no divergence from our primary findings and provide strong evidence of a nonlinear relationship between investor sentiment and future stock market volatility.     

eInformation: A Clinical Study of Investor Discussion and Sentiment

We examine the information flow for four stocks over seven months to trace the relationship between on-line discussion, news activity, and stock price movements. On-line discussions support numerous unsubstantiated rumors, substantial on-point exchanges, and quick dissemination of imminent and recently released information. Applying language-processing routines to message board postings and news, we create sentiment and disagreement measures or "eInformation." We analyze the determinants of sentiment and disagreement, and trace links between news, eInformation, and stock returns. This intensive clinical study of on-line discussions suggests mechanisms individual investors and groups can use to analyze and digest company information.     

THE DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME ANOMALY IN STOCK RETURNS: FACT OR FICTION?

Stock market returns in 22 markets around the world show no evidence of a daylight saving time effect. Returns on the days following a switch from or to daylight saving time do not behave any differently from stock market returns on any other day of the week or month. These results reject earlier conclusions in the literature—based on less data—that investors’ mood changes induced by changes in sleep patterns significantly affect stock returns.     

REVISITING MARKET EFFICIENCY: THE STOCK MARKET AS A COMPLEX ADAPTIVE SYSTEM

Well‐functioning financial markets are key to efficient resource allocation in a capitalist economy. While many managers express reservations about the accuracy of stock prices, most academics and practitioners agree that markets are efficient by some reasonable operational criterion. But if standard capital markets theory provides reasonably good predictions under “normal” circumstances, researchers have also discovered a number of “anomalies”—cases where the empirical data appear sharply at odds with the theory. Most notable are the occasional bursts of extreme stock price volatility (including the recent boom‐and‐bust cycle in the NASDAQ) and the limited success of the Capital Asset Pricing Model in accounting for the actual risk‐return behavior of stocks. This article addresses the question of how the market's efficiency arises. The central message is that managers can better understand markets as a complex adaptive system. Such systems start with a “heterogeneous” group of investors, whose interaction leads to “self‐organization” into groups with different investment styles. In contrast to market efficiency, where “marginal” investors are all assumed to be rational and well‐informed, the interaction of investors with different “decision rules” in a complex adaptive system creates a market that has properties and characteristics distinct from the individuals it comprises. For example, simulations of the behavior of complex adaptive systems suggest that, in most cases, the collective market will prove to be smarter than the average investor. But, on occasion, herding behavior by investors leads to “imbalances”—and, hence, to events like the crash of '87 and the recent plunge in the NASDAQ. In addition to its grounding in more realistic assumptions about the behavior of individual investors, the new model of complex adaptive systems offers predictions that are in some respects more consistent with empirical findings. Most important, the new model accommodates larger‐than‐normal stock price volatility (in statistician's terms, “fat‐tailed” distributions of prices) far more readily than standard efficient market theory. And to the extent that it does a better job of explaining volatility, this new model of investor behavior is likely to have implications for two key areas of corporate financial practice: risk management and investor relations. But even so, the new model leaves one of the main premises of modern finance theory largely intact–that the most reliable basis for valuing a company's stock is its discounted cash flow.     

STOCK PRICES AND INFLATION

Numerous empirical studies establish that inflation has a negative short‐run effect on stock returns but few studies report a positive, long‐run Fisher effect for stock returns. Using stock price and goods price data from six industrial countries, we show that long‐run Fisher elasticities of stock prices with respect to goods prices exceed unity and range from 1.04 to 1.65, which tends to support the Fisher effect. We also find that the time path of the response of stock prices to a shock in goods prices exhibits an initial negative response, which turns positive over longer horizons. These results help reconcile previous short‐run and long‐run empirical evidence on stock returns and inflation. Also, they reveal that stock prices have a long memory with respect to inflation shocks, such that investors should expect stocks to be a good inflation hedge over a long holding period. JEL Classification: G12     

STOCK DIVIDENDS AS SIGNALS

This study analyzes stock dividends as signals from managers. It is argued that in the presence of information asymmetries between managers and investors, stock dividends provide a relatively inexpensive and unambiguous signalling device. Based on an examination of the daily returns around 317 stock dividend announcements, it is concluded that these announcements are interpreted by investors as signals from managers. Further analysis also indicates that stock dividend size is positively related to announcement day returns.     

The pricing of sentiment risk in European stock markets

This paper studies whether sentiment is rewarded with a significant risk premium in the European stock markets. We examine several sentiment proxies and identify the Economic Sentiment Indicator from the EU Commission as the most relevant sentiment proxy for our sample. The analysis is performed for the contemporaneous excess returns of EA-11 stock markets in the period from February 1999 to September 2015. We apply a conditional multi-beta pricing model in order to track the variation of the sentiment risk premium over time. The results demonstrate a positive significant relationship between sentiment and contemporaneous excess returns which is consistent with previous studies. The calculated sentiment risk premium is significant as well but negative implying that an investment in EA-11 countries over the examined time period – that is bearing sentiment risk – would have been unattractive to the investors on average.     

The Evolving Shareholder Activist Landscape (How Companies Can Prepare for It)

Shareholder activists remain an important force in the boardroom. More than 60 activist campaigns were initiated against S&P 1500 companies in 2016. And although activist hedge funds have under‐performed the broad market since 2013, activists’ assets under management are still nearly double their level of four years ago, and announcements of their campaigns continue to be met with increases in the target companies’ stock prices. At the same time, shareholder activism continues to evolve in constructive ways. Most important is the growing support of mainstream investors, as reflected in the increased backing of activist proposals by traditional institutional asset managers and the falling number of openly confrontational campaigns. Activists have also had continued success in gaining board representation, particularly at the largest target companies. And more board seats are being gained by activists in early settlements, which have also been associated with higher stock returns than those campaigns that resulted in later settlements or ended in a proxy contest. During the period 2006–2016, over 40% of activist campaigns made public demands for specific strategic actions, such as selling assets, spinning off divisions, or seeking buyers for the companies. And activist investors have been remarkably effective in accomplishing such changes in that those activist targets urged to seek buyers were four times more likely to be acquired than the average company. At the same time, a growing number of campaigns have focused on operating efficiency, capital allocation, business strategy, and other changes that often require longterm engagement. Perhaps because of their longer‐term focus, such campaigns have also more been likely to result in board seats for the activists. The authors' findings contain a number of messages for corporate managements and boards: listen to your shareholders, and assess your strengths and vulnerabilities through an activist's eyes; build an effective board; articulate your strategy clearly; consider the possibility of activist intervention when planning M&A transactions; and engage early when approached by an activist.     

THE WEALTH EFFECTS OF TRACKING STOCK RESTRUCTURINGS

We provide a comprehensive examination of the post‐issue wealth effects of 29 completed tracking stock restructurings. We document that for the parent stock and for the combined firm, tracking stock restructurings lead to insignificant long‐term excess returns. However, we find that shareholders of tracking stocks realize significant post‐issue wealth losses. Unlike spin‐offs and carve‐outs, announcements of tracking stock restructurings are preceded by negative one‐year excess returns, and unlike the positive post‐issue long‐term excess returns to spin‐off stocks and the insignificant long‐term excess returns to carve‐out stocks, tracking stocks experience negative long‐term excess returns.     

Measuring investor sentiment with mutual fund flows

We investigate a proxy for monthly shifts between bond funds and equity funds in the USA: aggregate net exchanges of equity funds. This measure (which is negatively related to changes in VIX) is positively contemporaneously correlated with aggregate stock market excess returns: One standard deviation of net exchanges is related to 1.95% of market excess return. Our main new finding is that 85% (all) of the contemporaneous relation is reversed within four (ten) months. The effect is stronger in smaller stocks and in growth stocks. These findings support the notion of “noise” in aggregate market prices induced by investor sentiment.     

STOCK MARKET REACTION TO GOOD AND BAD INFLATION NEWS

This article shows that differentiating between good and bad inflation news is important to understanding how inflation affects stock market returns. Summing positive and negative inflation shocks as in previous studies tends to wash out or mute the effects of inflation news on stock returns. More specifically, we find that, depending on the economic state, positive and negative inflation shocks can produce a variety of stock market reactions. We conclude that the effect of inflation on stock returns is conditional on whether investors perceive inflation shocks as good or bad news in different economic states.     

Do stock price bubbles influence corporate investment?

Dispersion in investor beliefs and short-selling constraints can lead to stock market bubbles. This paper argues that firms, unlike investors, can exploit such bubbles by issuing new shares at inflated prices. This lowers the cost of capital and increases real investment. Perhaps surprisingly, large bubbles are not eliminated in equilibrium nor do large bubbles necessarily imply large distortions. Using the variance of analysts’ earnings forecasts to proxy for the dispersion of investor beliefs, we find that increases in dispersion cause increases in new equity issuance, Tobin's Q, and real investment, as predicted by the model.     

How Does Investor Sentiment Affect Stock Market Crises? Evidence from Panel Data

We test the impact of investor sentiment on a panel of international stock markets. Specifically, we examine the influence of investor sentiment on the probability of stock market crises. We find that investor sentiment increases the probability of occurrence of stock market crises within a one‐year horizon. The impact of investor sentiment on stock markets is more pronounced in countries that are culturally more prone to herd‐like behavior, overreaction and low institutional involvement.     

FORECASTING STOCK INDEX VOLATILITY: COMPARING IMPLIED VOLATILITY AND THE INTRADAY HIGH–LOW PRICE RANGE

The intraday high–low price range offers volatility forecasts similarly efficient to high‐quality implied volatility indexes published by the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) for four stock market indexes: S&P 500, S&P 100, NASDAQ 100, and Dow Jones Industrials. Examination of in‐sample and out‐of‐sample volatility forecasts reveals that neither implied volatility nor intraday high–low range volatility consistently outperforms the other.     

Responsible investment in the Chinese stock market

This paper provides insights into the current development of responsible investment in the Chinese stock market. We find that responsible investment can bring portfolio benefits to investors, and institutional investors have a holding preference for stocks in responsible investment indexes. By using a national air pollution proxy, we find that investors’ pessimistic mood on days with heavy air pollution has a negative influence on the stock return of A-shares, while stocks in responsible investment indexes display improved performance over the same time period. We use aggregated trading data to study the trading preference of Chinese retail investors on days when they are influenced by air pollution, and find that their total trading ratio shows a negative influence for both A-shares and responsible investment indexes. Moreover, there is more seller-initiated trading of the whole sample but more buyer-initiated trading of stocks in responsible investment indexes on air pollution days. This finding is consistent with the different stock return performances of these two samples. Our finding extends the studies of responsible investment to emerging markets and presents new evidence about the influence of environmental factors on trading behavior and return performance.     

STOCK RETURNS AND VOLATILITY ON CHINA'S STOCK MARKETS

We examine time‐series features of stock returns and volatility, as well as the relation between return and volatility in four of China's stock exchanges. Variance ratio tests reject the hypothesis that stock returns follow a random walk. We find evidence of long memory of returns. Application of GARCH and EGARCH models provides strong evidence of time‐varying volatility and shows volatility is highly persistent and predictable. The results of GARCH‐M do not show any relation between expected returns and expected risk. Daily trading volume used as a proxy for information arrival time has no significant explanatory power for the conditional volatility of daily returns. JEL classification: G15     

ANALYZING STOCK MARKET VOLATILITY USING EXTREME‐DAY MEASURES

We develop a simple measure of volatility based on extreme‐day returns and apply it to market returns from 1885 to 2002. Because returns are not normally distributed, the extreme‐day measure, which is distribution free, might provide a better measure of stock market risk than the traditional standard deviation. The extreme‐day measure more accurately explains investor behavior relative to standard deviation as shown by equity fund flows, and we find evidence that large negative changes appear to influence investor behavior more than large positive changes.     

STOCK MARKET REACTION TO ANTICIPATED VERSUS SURPRISE RATING CHANGES

I examine whether bond rating changes can be anticipated by investors and test whether the stock price reaction to the eventual change varies as a result. All else equal, the market reaction to changes that could have been easily predicted should be significantly smaller than the reaction to changes that are largely a surprise. Although rating upgrades prove difficult to predict, approximately 20% of downgrades can be correctly predicted using a relatively small number of publicly available variables. There is no significant difference between the stock price reaction to anticipated versus unanticipated rating changes.     

The impact of internet stock message boards on cross-sectional returns of small-capitalization stocks

We examine the impact of more than 2.5 million HotCopper messages on the Australian stock market. HotCopper is the largest online stock message board in Australia and the sample of messages covers over 2000 companies listed on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) from January 2003 through December 2008. We exclude messages surrounding public price-sensitive announcements released centrally by the ASX in order to examine the private information content of internet board messages. We find that the number of board messages and message sentiment significantly and positively relate to the contemporaneous returns of underperforming (low ROE, EBIT margin, EPS) small capitalization stocks with high market growth potential (low book-to-market). Posting activity is positively associated with trading volume for small stocks and negatively associated with bid-ask spreads for small and large stocks in the short term. Bullish small stocks outperform bearish ones significantly in respective days and months, exhibiting no return reversals to pre-message board activity levels in subsequent time periods. Large stocks are not found to be affected by message board activity. We conclude that higher message board activity quickly reflects itself into the prices of small capitalization stocks in a highly regulated market like the ASX.