PERFORMANCE OF STOLL's SPREAD COMPONENT ESTIMATOR: EVIDENCE FROM SIMULATIONS,TIME-SERIES,AND CROSS-SECTIONAL DATA

Stoll (1989) introduces an intuitive procedure to estimate the basic components of the bid-ask spread (order-processing cost, inventory cost, and adverse-selection cost). He also provides reasonable estimates of the magnitudes of the order-processing, inventory, and adverse-selection costs of making markets for a large cross-section of NASDAQ/NMS stocks. Empirical applications of Stoll's model produce widely different estimates of the bid-ask spread components. We derive the sampling properties of Stoll's estimator of the realized bid-ask spread, i.e., the sum of the order-processing and inventory components. We test Stoll's model in simulations, using the ideal conditions implied by the model. We conclude that noise in serial covariance estimates causes estimates of the realized spread to be severely biased and highly unreliable in short time-series and small cross-sectional samples.     

Option market liquidity: Commonality and other characteristics

This study examines option market liquidity using Ivy DB's OptionMetrics data. We establish convincing evidence of commonality for various liquidity measures based on the bid–ask spread, volumes, and price impact. The commonality remains strong even after controlling for the underlying stock market's liquidity and other liquidity determinants such as volatility. Smaller firms and firms with a higher volatility exhibit stronger commonalities in option liquidity. Aside from commonality, we also uncover several other important properties of the option market's liquidity. First, information asymmetry plays a much more dominant role than inventory risk as a fundamental driving force of liquidity. Second, the market-wide option liquidity is closely linked to the underlying stock market's movements. Specifically, the options liquidity responds asymmetrically to upward and downward market movements, with calls reacting more in up markets and puts reacting more in down markets.     

Informed Trading in Stock and Option Markets

We investigate the contribution of option markets to price discovery, using a modification of Hasbrouck's (1995) "information share" approach. Based on five years of stock and options data for 60 firms, we estimate the option market's contribution to price discovery to be about 17% on average. Option market price discovery is related to trading volume and spreads in both markets, and stock volatility. Price discovery across option strike prices is related to leverage, trading volume, and spreads. Our results are consistent with theoretical arguments that informed investors trade in both stock and option markets, suggesting an important informational role for options.     

FOREIGN OWNERSHIP RESTRICTIONS AND MARKET SEGMENTATION IN CHINA'S STOCK MARKETS

We study market segmentation in China's stock markets, in which local firms issue two classes of shares: class A shares available only to Chinese citizens and class B shares available only to foreign citizens. Significant stock price discounts are documented for class B shares. We find that the price difference is primarily due to illiquid B‐share markets. Relatively illiquid B‐share stocks have a higher expected return and are priced lower to compensate investors for increased trading costs. However, between the two classes of shares, B‐share prices tend to move more closely with market fundamentals than do A‐share prices. Therefore, we find A‐share premiums rather than B‐share discounts in China's markets. JEL classification: G15     

Hurst exponent behavior and assessment of the MENA stock markets efficiency

In this paper, we test the evolving efficiency of MENA stock markets. Our empirical approach is founded on the behavior of the Hurst exponent over time. We computed the Hurst exponent using a rolling sample with a time window of 4 years. The empirical investigation has been conducted on the major Middle East and North African stock markets. The sample data covers in daily frequency the period (January 1997 to December 2007). Our empirical results show that all MENA stock returns exhibit long-range memory and certain markets are becoming more efficient. Ranking MENA stock markets by efficiency with our measures of long-range dependence have shown that Israel's, Turkey's and Egypt's markets are the less inefficient markets in this region. Furthermore, we have founded evidence of statistically significant rank correlation between the measure of long-range dependence and average trading costs, market capitalization and anti-self-dealing index, which suggests that these variables play a role in explaining these differences in the stage of inefficiency.     

BACKDATING AND DIRECTOR INCENTIVES: MONEY OR REPUTATION?

We investigate how director incentives affect the occurrence of firms' backdating employee stock options. Directors with more wealth tied up in stock options may pursue activities that lead to personal gain, such as option backdating, which potentially increases the option recipient's compensation. We document a positive and significant association between director option compensation and the likelihood that firms backdate stock options. Our results question the effectiveness of director option compensation in aligning the interests with those of shareholders and help to explain the recent decline in the use of director option grants by many firms.     

Stock and option market divergence in the presence of noisy information

We examine market behavior of the stock and option markets upon the arrival of noisy information in the form of CNBC’s Mad Money recommendations. If stock and option markets are not equally efficient, they should respond differently to noisy information, with the less efficient market more susceptible to noise. We find that the stock market is less efficient than the option market. The abnormal difference between option-implied and actual stock returns is negative and significant upon exposure to noisy information. This difference may yield an economically significant monthly trading profit of up to 5%. We conclude that the stock market is more susceptible to noisy information than the option market and is therefore less efficient.     

Measuring the impact of option market activity on the stock market: Bivariate point process models of stock and option transactions

I apply the bivariate Autoregressive Conditional Duration model of Engle and Lunde [2003. Trade and quotes: a bivariate point process. Journal of Financial Econometrics 1, 159–188] to stock and option market transactions. The first model uses option trades and stock trades. Shocks to option trade/option trade durations have a significant impact on option trade/stock trade durations. Higher implied volatility, larger stock and option market order imbalances, larger stock trades, larger spreads, smaller depths in the stock market and faster trading in the stock and option markets are all associated with faster trading in both markets. In the second model, option trade/option trade timing leads option trade/stock quote timing and several information-related stock and option market covariates impact the expected inter-market event durations.     

Stock markets,credit markets,and technology-led growth

The high-tech sector accounts for the majority of corporate innovation in modern economies. In a sample of 38 countries, we document a strong positive relation between the initial size of the country's high-tech sector and subsequent rates of GDP and total factor productivity growth. We also find a strong positive connection between a country's equity (but not credit) market development and the size of its high-tech sector. Our main difference-in-differences estimates show that better developed stock markets support faster growth of innovative-intensive, high-tech industries. The main channels for this effect are higher rates of productivity and faster growth in the number of new high-tech firms. Credit market development fosters growth in industries that rely on external finance for physical capital accumulation but is unimportant for growth in innovation-intensive industries. These findings show that stock markets and credit markets play important but distinct roles in supporting economic growth. Stock markets are uniquely suited for financing technology-led growth, a particularly important concern for advanced economies.     

Is there price discovery in equity options?

We use tick-by-tick quote data for 39 liquid US stocks and options on them, and we focus on events when the two markets disagree about the stock price in the sense that the option-implied stock price obtained from the put-call parity relation is inconsistent with the actual stock price. Option market quotes adjust to eliminate the disagreement, while the stock market quotes behave normally, as if there were no disagreement. The disagreement events are typically precipitated by stock price movements and display signed option volume in the direction that tends to eliminate the disagreements. These results show that option price quotes do not contain economically significant information about future stock prices beyond what is already reflected in current stock prices, i.e., no economically significant price discovery occurs in the option market. We also find no option market price discovery using a much larger sample of disagreement events based on a weaker definition of a disagreement, which verifies that the findings for the primary sample are not due to unusual or unrepresentative market behavior during the put-call parity violations.     

Informed Trading Around Earnings Announcements: Another Look

This study is an empirical test of the Easley, O'Hara, and Srinivas (1998) multimarket sequential trade model of stock and option markets. We employ two approaches to determine the information content of signed stock and option trades executed around quarterly earnings announcements. The first approach expands the vector autoregression (VAR) technique of Hasbrouck (1991a) to include signed option trade volumes and inter‐trade durations. Estimates from the VAR models provide insight into whether both equity and option trades are viewed as informative by the equity specialist. The second approach focuses on the information content of the earnings releases to determine whether signed equity and option trades executed prior to the announcements are informed. Results indicate that although informed traders prefer to transact in both markets around earnings announcements, option market transactions contain no incremental information.     

Environmental,social, and governance premium in Chinese stock markets

Financial markets have increasingly adopted the concept of ESG (environmental, social, and governance); this paper studies the evolving effect of corporate ESG performance on the stock returns in China's stock markets. Utilizing the Paris Agreement and China's President Xi's pledge to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060 as ESG shocks, we find that firms with lower ESG scores provide higher stock returns after the announcement of the Paris Agreement. Furthermore, the effect of ESG performance heightens after Xi's pledge. Using sorted portfolios and Fama–French factor models, we find that investors are rewarded for bearing ESG-related risks. Our estimated monthly ESG risk premium is between 0.52% and 0.61%, while state-owned firms with larger market capitalizations and better financial and operational performance tend to have better ESG performance.     

UNLISTED TRADING PRIVILEGES,LIQUIDITY, AND STOCK RETURNS

In this study we examine the effect of dual trading through unlisted trading privileges (UTPs) on liquidity and stock returns. Stocks with UTPs trade in a different market structure than stocks listed and traded only on the AMEX and NYSE. Differences in market structure may affect stock returns through liquidity services provided by the competing markets. The sample comprises 852 AMEX and NYSE firms that began unlisted trading on the Philadelphia, Pacific, Midwest, or Cincinnati exchanges between 1984 and 1988. The results show significantly positive abnormal returns around the SEC's announcement of a regional exchange's filing for UTPs. The results also suggest that increased competition improves trading liquidity. Only stocks with low liquidity before UTPs announcements experience significantly improved liquidity and positive stock returns.     

CEO EQUITY PORTFOLIO INCENTIVES AND LAYOFF DECISIONS

CEOs with higher equity‐based compensation are widely believed to be more likely to act in shareholders' interests. Unlike less common acquisitions, voluntary liquidations, or seasoned equity offerings, layoffs are comparatively common elements of firms' operating strategies. We find that CEOs with at least one year of tenure who possess greater incentives from portfolios of restricted stock and stock option grants are more likely to announce layoffs, and that these layoffs create shareholder value. We conclude that accumulated portfolios of restricted stock and stock option grants encourage CEOs to adopt operating strategies that improve operating profits and stock performance.     

The impacts of climate policy uncertainty on stock markets: Comparison between China and the US

The interplay between climate policy uncertainty and stock market performance has emerged as a pressing research question in light of the challenges posed by climate change to financial markets. This paper measures China's daily and monthly climate policy uncertainty (CPU) from Jan 2000 to Mar 2022 based on Chinese news data for the first time. Then, the nonlinear and lag impacts of the US CPU and China's CPU on the return, volatility, correlation and tail dependence of China's and US stock markets are investigated and compared by adopting copula function and the distribution lag nonlinear model (DLNM). The data of stock markets includes the Shanghai Composite Index (SSCI) and NASDAQ from Jan 2000 to Mar 2022 from the Choice database, and the Shenzhen Composite Index (SCI) and S&P 500 are used for the robustness test. The empirical results indicate that (1) the growth trend of China’s CPU index is similar to that of the US. However, there are significant differences between the impacts of these two CPUs on stock markets. (2) For China, high CPU decreases current stock market return and increases volatility but decreases it in the future. It could also increase the upper tail dependence between China’s and the US stock markets’ volatilities in current period. (3) For the US, CPU decreases stock market return in the short term but increases it in the long term. High CPU increases volatility in short term, decreases volatility in 5 months and increases it again after 6 months. Both low and high CPU could increase the correlation between China's and US stock markets' volatilities.     

Was Deng Xiaoping Right? An Overview of China's Equity Markets

In the western world, stock markets arose from the search by privately owned companies for capital to build their businesses. Over time, the markets became places where ownership interests and even entire companies were bought and sold. In China, the complete opposite has happened. The markets arose out of the need for capital by bankrupt state‐owned enterprises operating in an economy with no history of private property. Deng Xiaoping, China's last emperor, gave the green light for the stock market experiment in early 1992 more with the hope of encouraging reform and efficiency than from any conviction that stock markets were the next sure thing. Now, after more than 20 years of experimentation with domestic and international listings, it appears evident that stock markets whose primary function is to trade minority interests in government‐controlled companies have not achieved the goal of improving enterprise performance, as China's leaders originally hoped. Instead, the combination of state monopolies with Wall Street expertise and international capital has led to the creation of national companies that represent little more than the incorporation of China's old Soviet‐style industrial ministries. As for the markets, the government's determination to prevent real privatization has produced separate classes of shares that are defined almost entirely by one thing: the shareholder's relationship to the government. And with all aspects of stock market activity regulated, managed, and owned by various state agencies, it is not surprising that non‐state investors have become motivated more by speculative opportunities than by investment fundamentals. But a quarter of a century is a short time in any country's development and, for all their shortcomings, the markets in mainland China and Hong Kong have played a significant role raising capital for China. It may be too early, perhaps, to suggest that China's equity markets have failed to accomplish what they were intended to do.     

Stock price firm‐specific information on the choice of stock payment in mergers and acquisitions

Previous studies on the choice of stock payment in M&A mainly focus on managerial private information. This study shows that managers also learn new firm‐specific information from financial markets in making this decision. The acquirer's stock price firm‐specific information increases the stock‐payment‐to‐Q sensitivity. The target's stock price firm‐specific information decreases the stock payment probability. Further analyses on deal and firm characteristics as well as shareholder wealth in stock mergers support the managerial learning argument. Overall, this study highlights a new set of information that affects the form of merger payment in mergers and acquisitions.     

Commodity Prices and Stock Market Behavior in South American Countries in the Short Run

Using Geweke feedback measures, we present empirical evidence that largely supports the hypothesis that the stock markets of South American countries are highly affected by changes in commodity prices after controlling for changes in exchange rates, interest rates, and North American stock market changes. In total, six different Goldman Sachs commodity price indexes are tested against the unexplained variation in stock market returns for Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Peru, and Venezuela, covering the period 1995-2007. The Argentinian, Brazilian, and Peruvian stock markets are significantly affected by changes in commodity prices the same day. Venezuela's stock market, however, does not react to changes in commodity prices, even including energy prices. Stock market returns for Chile show a contemporaneous relation with energy and metals prices, whereas Colombia's equity market is affected by price changes for agricultural and industrial metals. In all cases, we find a contemporaneous relation and no indication of a lead or lag relationship.     

Are stock and real estate markets integrated? An empirical study of six Asian economies

Rising asset prices spurred by Asia's emerging economy have drawn much attention recently. This study examines one source of growth patterns in asset prices by analyzing the integration relationship between stock markets and real estate markets in Asia. Six economies are selected for empirical analysis: China, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan. Results show that stock markets are integrated with real estate markets in Japan, and partially integrated with real estate markets in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. This implies that these two investment vehicles are substitutable in China, Hong Kong, Japan, and Taiwan, and provide diversification potential for investment portfolios in South Korea and Singapore. Examining the timing of market changes, we found the real estate market leading the stock market in some countries, and the stock market leading the real estate market in others. We conclude that stock and real estate markets show a variety of inter-relationships depending on economic and political policy environments.     

Why Do Price Limits Exist in Stock Markets? A Manipulation‐Based Explanation

Numerous stock market regulators around the world impose daily price limits on individual stock price movements. We derive a simple model that shows that price limits may deter stock market manipulators. Based on our model's implications, we predict that regulators impose price limit rules for markets where the likelihood of manipulation is high. We present empirical evidence consistent with this hypothesis. Our study is the first to formally propose a manipulation‐based rationale for the existence of price limits in stock markets.