Petrochemical Products Market and Stock Market Returns: Empirical Evidence from Tehran Stock Exchange

Abstract

While the relationship between stock market return and oil price is of great interest to researchers, previous studies do not investigate stock market return with petrochemical products market. In this paper, we analyzed the relationship between prices of main petrochemical products and stock returns of petrochemical companies in Tehran stock exchange. Using a panel data model and GLS estimation method, we investigated the effect of methanol, propane, and urea prices along with financial variables on stock returns of six big petrochemical companies during 2001 to 2013. Results show that although changes in prices of petrochemical products have direct effect on stock returns of all petrochemical companies, this effect is much higher for smaller companies.