The Cross-Border Impact of Political Violence

Abstract

AbstractThis paper documents the reallocation of financial and economic resources after political violence to other countries. It analyzes the impact of 66 political violence events that took place in 32 countries on 57 stock exchanges over a period of 20 years. Using the event study methodology, this paper is the first to document a positive financial impact from political violence in other countries. The results show that in globally integrated markets, the substitution of financial and economic activities away from afflicted countries magnifies their losses. On average over a 20 day window, event countries suffered a 2.9% drop in stock valuation while other countries picked a windfall of 0.8%. Additionally, the paper investigates the geographic, economic, and risk determinants of this cross-border flow of capital.