Abstract
This study examines the betting against beta (BAB) anomaly and its drivers for five major Asian markets, using data from January 1999 to January 2020. We find positive raw returns-based BAB premiums for India, China, and South Korea, while they are negative in Japan and Indonesia. Cross-sectional differences in BAB premiums seem to be positively associated with the level of information uncertainty and financial market development. Decomposition of the BAB phenomenon shows that BAB premiums are driven by betting against correlation (BAC) premiums in India while betting against volatility (BAV) premiums drive it in China and S.Korea. Funding liquidity risk and margin constraints drive positive BAC in India and Indonesia. Positive BAV in China is driven by MAX (lottery behavior), while idiosyncratic volatility (IVOL) and MAX together drive them in S.Korea. Negative BAB in Japan and Indonesia is mainly due to negative BAV premiums caused by MAX in Japan and both IVOL and MAX in Indonesia. CAPM-based risk-adjusted BAB premiums are not significant for S.Korea, Japan, and Indonesia, while in India and China, they are significant but get explained by the profitability factor. We conclude that the BAB strategy is not universally applicable, and its drivers vary across sample markets.
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