Market efficiency and volatility within and across cryptocurrency benchmark indexes

Abstract

With initial coin offerings and token offerings remaining at the forefront of alternative investments, the study of peer groups can be important for comparing investors’ tastes and preferences for particular classes of cryptocurrency on a more equal footing. The aim of this paper is to identify violations of the weak-form market efficiency hypothesis for comparable cryptoassets that are conditional on market segmentation and those conditional on benchmarks. We use daily frequency data of 57 cryptocurrencies that account for more than 90% of the total market capitalization (market cap). We construct seven thematic market cap indexes that are able to represent the whole cryptocurrency universe. Against this background, we test for the presence of four empirical anomalies: risk premium, leverage, regime switch and calendar effects, both across and within these benchmark indexes. The main results support the existence of a switch between two states and positive excess returns toward the end of the week for both cases. Our methodology and findings contribute to the emerging literature on introducing active and passive portfolio management strategies that track benchmark crypto indexes.