Information Content of Order Flow and Cross-Market Portfolio Rebalancing: Evidence for the Chinese Stock, Treasury and Corporate Bond Markets

Abstract

This paper examines the within-market and cross-market information content of order flow for stocks, corporate bonds and Treasury bonds in China. With daily-aggregated tick-by-tick data over three years on the Shanghai Security Exchange, we find negative cross-asset effects of order flow on returns, both between stocks and bonds and between corporate and Treasury bonds. Our results provide evidence that not only cross-market portfolio rebalancing under general market conditions, but also flight-to-quality, which occurs particularly under extreme market conditions, are responsible for the cross-market effects of order flow. In particular, while Treasury bonds play a dominant role in stock-bond portfolio rebalancing, corporate bonds can replace Treasury bonds as a safe “haven” during extreme stock market conditions or during a fall in Treasury bond market returns.