Tests of technical trading rules and the 52-week high strategy in the corporate bond market

Abstract

This article presents the first tests of technical trend-following rules (TTRs) and the 52-week high strategy in individual corporate bonds, along with comparisons to corresponding stocks. Over the 2002–2015 period, TTR and the 52-week strategy are unprofitable in both bonds and stocks. Short legs of these trend-following strategies lead to significant losses in corporate bonds, which can be interpreted as evidence of bond investors' overreaction to bad news. Thus, short-term contrarian strategies, the profitability of which is viewed as the reward to liquidity provision, are more rewarding in corporate bonds. TTR buy signals can predict lower-volatility days in bonds as in stocks, despite the low/negative return correlations between the two.