Gulf Cooperation Council Stock Market Research Articles

Decomposed oil price shocks and GCC stock market sector returns and volatility

This study investigates dynamic mean and tail-based connectedness between decomposed oil price shocks (demand shock, supply shock, and risk shock) and Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stock returns and volatility at the aggregate and sectoral levels of stock data. The sample period is January 13, 2012 - January 14, 2022, covering calm and turbulent periods. The results of mean-based connectedness show generally low levels of connectedness over the full sample period for both return and volatility, despite some time-variation and irregularity in the patterns of connectedness across stock sectors. Total, directional, and pairwise connectedness measures surge significantly during Phase 1 of COVID-19, highlighting the pandemic's influence on the oil shocks–GCC stocks nexus. However, Phase 2 of COVID-19 displays a gradual reduction in return and volatility connectedness, which could be attributed to fiscal stimulus and COVID19 relief packages adopted by policymakers to contain the adverse impact of the virus on the economy. Quantile-based connectedness measures reveal evidence of heterogeneity in the impacts of oil shocks across the various quantiles of stock sector returns and volatility. Unlike supply shock, demand shock is a net transmitter of spillovers, irrespective of the quantiles. Volatility connectedness is stronger at the high volatility state than the moderate and low volatility states for all sectors, but strongest for the industrials sector. The results indicate that modelling oil shocks and GCC stock sector returns and volatility should concentrate on the most influential oil shocks (e.g. demand shock) affecting the lower and upper quantiles of sector returns and upper quantiles of sector volatility, especially for the industrials. The findings have implications for improving portfolio risk management and regulatory procedures, which should be necessary to address spillover effects from decomposed oil shocks in the stock markets of oil-exporters such as GCC countries.

The directional spillover effects and time-frequency nexus between stock markets, cryptocurrency, and investor sentiment during the COVID-19 pandemic

PurposeThis paper aims to analyze the connectedness between Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stock market index and cryptocurrencies. It investigates the relevant impact of RavenPack COVID sentiment on the dynamic of stock market indices and conventional cryptocurrencies as well as their Islamic counterparts during the onset of the COVID-19 crisis.Design/methodology/approachThe authors rely on the methodology of Diebold and Yilmaz (2012, 2014) to construct network-associated measures. Then, the wavelet coherence model was applied to explore co-movements between GCC stock markets, cryptocurrencies and RavenPack COVID sentiment. As a robustness check, the authors used the time-frequency connectedness developed by Barunik and Krehlik (2018) to verify the direction and scale connectedness among these markets.FindingsThe results illustrate the effect of COVID-19 on all cryptocurrency markets. The time variations of stock returns display stylized fact tails and volatility clustering for all return series. This stressful period increased investor pessimism and fears and generated negative emotions. The findings also highlight a high spillover of shocks between RavenPack COVID sentiment, Islamic and conventional stock return indices and cryptocurrencies. In addition, we find that RavenPack COVID sentiment is the main net transmitter of shocks for all conventional market indices and that most Islamic indices and cryptocurrencies are net receivers.Practical implicationsThis study provides two main types of implications: On the one hand, it helps fund managers adjust the risk exposure of their portfolio by including stocks that significantly respond to COVID-19 sentiment and those that do not. On the other hand, the volatility mechanism and investor sentiment can be interesting for investors as it allows them to consider the dynamics of each market and thus optimize the asset portfolio allocation.Originality/valueThis finding suggests that the RavenPack COVID sentiment is a net transmitter of shocks. It is considered a prominent channel of shock spillovers during the health crisis, which confirms the behavioral contagion. This study also identifies the contribution of particular interest to fund managers and investors. In fact, it helps them design their portfolio strategy accordingly.

Global hidden factors predicting financial distress in Gulf Arab states: a quantile–time–frequency analysis

PurposeThis study aims to uncover the main predictors of financial distress in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries using a wide range of global factors and asset classes.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses novel approaches that take into account extreme events as well as the nonlinear behavior of time series over various time intervals (i.e. short, medium and long term) and during boom and bust episodes. This study primarily uses the conditional value at risk (CoVaR), the quantile multivariate causality test and the partial wavelet coherence method. The data collection period ranges from March 2014 to September 2022.FindingsUS T-bills and gold are the primary factors that can increase financial stability in the GCC region, according to VaRs and CoVaRs. More proof of the predictive value of the oil, gold and wheat markets, as well as geopolitical tensions, uncertainty over US policy and volatility in the oil and US equities markets, is provided by the multivariate causality test. When low extreme quantiles or cross extreme quantiles are taken into account, these results are substantial and sturdy. Lastly, after adjusting for the effect of crude oil prices, this study’s wavelet coherence results indicate diminished long-run connections between the GCC stock market and the chosen global determinants.Research limitations/implicationsDespite the implications of the author’s research for decision makers, there are some limitations mainly related to the selection of Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) GCC ex-Saudi Arabia. Considering the economic importance of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) in the region, the author believes that it would be better to include this country in the data to obtain more robust results. In addition, there is evidence in the literature of the existence of heterogeneous responses to global shocks; some markets are more vulnerable than others. This is another limitation of this study, as this study considers the GCC as a bloc rather than each country individually. These limitations could open up further research opportunities.Originality/valueThese findings are important for investors seeking to manage their portfolios under extreme market conditions. They are also important for government policies aimed at mitigating the impact of external shocks.

COVID-19 and GCC stock market performance: an analysis of the boon (financial stimulus package) and curse (oil price plunge) effects

PurposeThis study aims to investigate the reaction (in terms of returns and volatility) of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) country-wise stock markets (both conventional and Islamic) in response to the surge of COVID-19 cases, with special reference to the announcement of financial stimulus packages in each country and the recent global oil price plunge. Further, the study also examines the impact of COVID-19 cases on the stock market returns of each GCC country and the continuous dynamics of correlation between COVID-19 cases and GCC stock markets.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses an exponential generalized auto regressive conditional heteroskedasticity model and continuous wavelet coherence to estimate the stock market volatility and co-movement between COVID-19 cases and stock returns.FindingsEmpirical findings indicate an adverse reaction (negative returns and high volatility) during the period examined, with the stimulus package resulting in a positive transformation of returns in each country-level stock market as well as the regional stock index. Further, no evidence of an adverse effect of the oil price plunge is identified. All findings are identical between both conventional and Islamic stock indices.Originality/valueWhile ample research has been conducted on the impact and dynamics of the pandemic on stock markets, little has addressed the areas of financial stimulus packages and the oil price plunge. The findings of this study show that further research needs to be conducted to elucidate the ways in which effective financial stimulus packages can be formulated in the GCC region to mitigate the adverse effects of COVID-19 for economies without causing major financial deficits, as well as to find strategies to diversify economies away from the oil curse.

Impact of Covid-19 pandemic on stock market returns volatility of Gulf Cooperation Council countries

This study examined the asymmetric impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stock market return volatility. The data included daily closing prices of the GCC stock market from the day of the acknowledgment of the first case of COVID-19 in each country to March 6, 2021. In addition, the study employed generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity (GARCH) family models. According to the Akaike information criterion, GARCH and exponential GARCH (EGARCH) were the most accurate models. The findings of the GARCH model indicate that the COVID-19 pandemic affected the GCC stock markets. The EGARCH model also confirmed the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the GCC stock markets, confirming that the COVID-19 negatively affected GCC stock market returns. The value of the persistence of this volatility continued over a long period. This study has potential implications for investors and policymakers in diversifying investment portfolios and adopting strategies to maintain investor confidence during such crises. Moreover, mechanisms must be developed for reducing risks in financial markets in times of crisis, and central banks should take financial measures to mitigate risks to capital markets. AcknowledgmentsThis achievement was made with the aid of my family’s support, thank you all.

Audit Committee Attributes, Audit Quality, and Financial Reporting Quality: Evidence from the GCC Stock Markets

The main objective of this study is to empirically investigate whether the audit committee (AC) attributes and the quality of external auditor are associated with financial reporting quality (FRQ) of companies listed on the gulf cooperation council (GCC) countries’ stock markets. To achieve the study’s objectives, data was collected from a sample of 115 companies from four GCC countries during the period from 2017-2019 that represents 345 firm-year observations. Five hypotheses were tested, FRQ as dependent variable was regressed with five independent variables. For measuring the FRQ, the author adopted the qualitative approach using checklist developed by Beest, et al. 2009 sponsored by Nijmegen Center for Economics (NiCE) with limited modification based on the new amendments of IASB conceptual framework in 2018. The study findings reveal that the level of FRQ on the study sample averaged 63% while the minimum and the maximum valued 40% and 86% respectively. The findings indicate that FRQ are positively and significantly associated with the four AC attributes and quality of external auditor so, all hypotheses are accepted, which infer that FRQ will be enhanced if a company formed AC having, bigger size, more independence, financial experience, meetings frequently, and hiring high quality external auditor. The findings of this study have wide implications to all stakeholders especially, investors, creditors, auditors, management, in addition to stock markets regulators and standard-sitting bodies for the role of AC attributes and external auditor on improving FRQ

Risk spillover from crude oil prices to GCC stock market returns: New evidence during the COVID-19 outbreak

In this study, we examine oil price extreme tail risk spillover to individual Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stock markets and quantify this spillover’s shift before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. A dynamic conditional correlation generalized autoregressive heteroscedastic (DCC- GARCH) model is employed to estimate three important measures of tail dependence risk: conditional value at risk (CoVaR), delta CoVaR (ΔCoVaR), and marginal expected shortfall (MES). Using daily data from January 2017 until May 2020, results point to significant systemic oil risk spillover in all GCC stock markets. In particular, the effect of oil price systemic risk on GCC stock market returns was significantly larger during COVID-19 than before the pandemic. Upon splitting COVID-19 into two phases based on severity, we identify Saudi Arabia as the only GCC market to have experienced significantly higher exposure to oil risk in Phase 1. Although all GCC stock markets received greater oil systemic risk spillover in Phase 2 of COVID-19, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates appeared more vulnerable to oil extreme risk than other countries. Our empirical findings reveal that investors should carefully consider the extreme oil risk effects on GCC stock markets when designing optimal portfolio strategies, minimizing portfolio risk, and adopting dynamic diversification process. Policymakers and regulators should also enact awareness, oversight, and action plans to minimize adverse oil risk effects.

Herding behaviour theory and oil price dispersion: a sectoral analysis of the Gulf Cooperation Council stock market

This paper investigates the impact of oil price changes on herding behaviour in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stock market. For this purpose, a sectoral analysis was employed. Based on a combination of the methodologies of Ulussever and Demirer (Cent Bank Rev 17:77–89, 2017) and Medhioub and Chaffai (Int J Financ Stud 7(65):1–11, 2019) and using daily prices for the five GCC sectors from 6 July 2014 to 31 December 2019, the results showed that the impact of changes in oil price movements on herding behaviour differs among sectors and subperiods. Further, we discovered that some sectors herd around the oil price returns during falling and that oil return dispersions have a dominant influence on some sectors during downward and/or upward periods.

Predictability of GCC stock returns: The role of geopolitical risk and crude oil returns

Stock return predictability has always been one of the central themes of finance literature, given its crucial implications for investment decisions, risk management, and financial and monetary policymaking. This paper evaluates the in-sample and out-of-sample stock return predictive power of the global and Saudi geopolitical risk indices and crude oil returns in the context of six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries. Monthly data from February 2007 to December 2019 and the feasible generalized least square (FGLS) estimator for predictive modelling by Westerlund and Narayan (2012, 2015) are used. Global and Saudi GPR indices show weak evidence of in-sample predictability of excess stock returns. However, the out-of-sample forecasts show that only the global geopolitical risk index provides superior prediction in the context of Kuwaiti and Omani stock markets, compared to the historical average benchmark model. Crude oil prices are shown to be a better predictor in most cases, in both in-sample and out-of-sample forecast models The results imply that crude oil returns can be used for active prediction of GCC stock market returns, once econometric issues are accounted for. The findings remain mostly unaffected when excess risk adjusted returns are used.

Integration of the GCC Stock Markets

This study analyzes the short- and long-term interdependence among the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stock markets, namely, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Emirates, and Oman. The study finds a solid long-term relationship among the GCC stock markets and that each market contributes significantly to that relationship. The short-term relationship is also supported through the causality tests as well as through impulse response functions. The analysis reveals the Kuwait stock market to be the most influential during the examined period. Also, a feedback exists between the Saudi and the Emirates stock markets. In order to corroborate the results, an ARDL model is specified and its results confirm the cointegration tests. Overall, the results place doubts against the investment diversification principle.

Dynamic Spillovers between Gulf Cooperation Council’s Stocks, VIX, Oil and Gold Volatility Indices

This paper analyzes the conditional correlations between the stock market returns of countries that are members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The innovative aspects of the paper consist of focusing on three volatility indices: the oil (OVX), gold (GVZ), and S&P500 (VIX) markets (considered in log-difference). We use weekly data and resort to DCC-GARCH modeling. The novelty of the paper consists in revealing that: (i) GCC stock market returns are negatively correlated with each of the volatility measures, and the correlations are stronger during crisis periods; (ii) GCC stock returns are mostly correlated with oil shocks; and (iii) Saudi Arabia and Qatar are the most responsive to all shocks among the GCC countries, while Bahrain correlates weakly to shocks in oil, gold, and VIX. The most striking results feature extra sensitivity of Saudi Arabia and Qatar in terms of volatility indices, which should be the foremost concern of policymakers and banking analysts.

US Economic Policy Uncertainty and GCC Stock Market Performance

Abstract The study evaluates the effect of economy policy uncertainty of US on gulf cooperation council (GCC) countries’ stock market returns. The GCC countries are Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain and Oman. Granger Causality Tests (GCT) was done primarily to evaluate if economy policy uncertainty granger cause on GCC stock market returns. The analysis established that oil prices granger cause stock market returns for Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and UAE; the same is not true on changes in economic policy uncertainty of US cause on the stock market returns. Changes in economy policy uncertainty in US granger causes on stock market returns of Bahrain. On the other hand, economy policy uncertainty in US does not cause stock market returns in Qatar, UAE, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Vector Autoregression (VAR) analysis establishes that economy policy uncertainty in US negatively responds to the stock market returns of the GCC countries.

Can crude oil drive the co-movement in the international stock market? Evidence from partial wavelet coherence analysis

In this paper, we employ partial- and multiple-wavelet coherence analyses to examine co-movement between international stock markets by considering the influence of crude oil in a time domain perspective. Overall, we find that crude oil is a major factor driving co-movement between international stock markets in the median and long term. However, when considering the oil-importing and oil-exporting countries differently, we still find that crude oil is a driver for interdependence between oil-importing and oil-exporting countries. In contrast, the crude oil has relative lower impact on the co-movement in oil-importing or in oil-exporting countries, which indicates its co-movement is caused by other factors. In addition, Gulf Cooperation Council stock market may lead the stock markets of oil-importing countries in the long term. Our empirical results provide meaningful information for investors and policymakers.

US economic policy uncertainty spillover on the stock markets of the GCC countries

PurposeThis study aims to investigate the nature and degree of US economic policy uncertainty spillover on the stock markets of a group of non-conventional economies like the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, where a risk-sharing-based financial system is prominent and foreign investment, risk-free interest, derivatives, etc. are not as widespread as in the western economies.Design/methodology/approachthe monthly data of 1992–2018, linear and nonlinear structural vector autoregression (VAR) model, and an impulse response-based test to explore the nature and degree of US economic policy uncertainty spillover on the stock markets of the GCC countries.FindingsThis study finds that an unexpected increase in the US economic policy uncertainty significantly decreases the stock market index of all the GCC countries. This study also gets this relationship symmetric, meaning that the GCC stock market indices decrease and increase by the same amount when the US economic policy uncertainty increases and decreases, respectively.Originality/valueThis study investigates the characteristics of economic policy uncertainty spillover from the biggest economy of the world to the stock markets of the GCC region, which is new to the literature. The study results provide the first evidence that a risk-sharing based financial system does not necessarily protect the stock market from US uncertainty shock. However, the abundance of local investors, risk-sharing investment activities, the absence of derivatives, etc. may be responsible for the symmetric behavior of a stock market.

US Economic Policy Uncertainty and GCC Stock Market

This study contributes to the scant finance literature on emerging countries by examining the relationship between economic policy uncertainty and monthly indices of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stock markets during the period of July 2004 to August 2018. Both U.S. and global economic policy uncertainties exert significant and negative long run influence on stock prices in Bahrain and Kuwait. The impact of U.S. economic policy risk, however, is relatively stronger. Other stock markets in the GCC region, on the other hand, are not affected by U.S. and global economic policy uncertainty. These markets present a sound alternative for international portfolio diversification when the global economic policy uncertainty is on the rise.

Investigating the Asymmetric Impact of Oil Prices on GCC Stock Markets

This paper investigates the presence of asymmetric relationship between oil price movements and Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stock markets. We propose the implementation of nonlinear vector smooth transition regression (VSTR) models which offer a greater flexibility when modelling the possible asymmetric reaction in equities. Contrary to conventional wisdom, our empirical results reveal that GCC stock markets do not have similar sensitivities to oil price changes. We document that oil price changes have asymmetric effects on stock returns in some GCC countries, but not for others. More specifically, we find four out of six GCC stock markets that are more sensitive to large oil deviations than to small ones. Our results highlight the importance of economic stabilization and reform policies that can potentially reduce the sensitivity of stock returns to oil price changes, especially with regard to the existence of asymmetric behavior.

The Impact of US Economic Policy Uncertainty Shock on GCC Stock Market Performance

Abstract This study examines the impact of the United States’ Economy Policy Uncertainty (US EPU) shocks on the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries’ stock market returns which are heavily related through global oil markets. Using monthly data spanning from 31/01/2010 to 31/08/2018, we employ a Non-Structural Vector Autoregression (VAR) and Vector Granger Causality Tests (VGCT) in order to ascertain the magnitude of transmitted shocks and to primarily evaluate if US EPU affects stock market returns in any of the GCC countries. Our OLS and VAR results suggest that US EPU has little impact on the GCC markets with the exception of Bahrain. The Vector Granger Causality Test confirms that changes in US EPU influence returns on Qatar’s stock market. These results will help GCC nations to stabilize global energy markets and prevent economic ripples to policy shocks.

The Effect of Regional Geopolitical Risk on the Gulf Cooperation Council Stock Market Returns

The Effect of Regional Geopolitical Risk on the Gulf Cooperation Council Stock Market Returns

Shocks and Volatility Spillover Between Stock Markets of Developed Countries and GCC Stock Markets

ABSTRACTThe purpose of this paper is to examine the spillover of returns, information and volatility of returns, and conditional variance-covariance between the stock markets of developed countries namely the United States of America, the United Kingdom and China (US, UK and CH) and the stock markets of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries (Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Bahrain) using daily returns spanned from 2 March 2003 to 9 December 2010. We consider shocks and volatility spillover model by applying a multivariate generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (MGARCH) model using; MGARCH-BEKK to identify the source and magnitude of volatility and shock spillover. We get the correlation between GCC markets is positive, indicating that there is a common factor which is driving the markets towards the same direction. Evidence shows that the own-shocks and volatility in GCC markets are highly significant. Cross-information spillover effects, as another observable trend, are found between Qatar and Oman. Furthermore, the results show that UA is significantly affected by spillover (return, shocks and volatility) from developed markets, while there have been no significant effects seen from Kuwait markets. This study takes a new empirical look in the sense that the models incorporating all the countries under investigation are estimated jointly utilizing multivariate GARCH-BEKK formulation. In addition, this paper should be interesting for academicians as well as practitioners. Including those interested in modelling multivariate volatility for financial market risk management.

Herding behavior in Islamic GCC stock market: a daily analysis

PurposeThis paper aims to examine the presence of herd behaviour in the Islamic Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stock markets following the methodology given by Chiang and Zheng (2010). Generalized auto regressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH)-type models and quantile regression analysis are used and applied to daily data ranging from 3 January 2010 to 28 July 2016. Results show evidence of herd behaviour in the GCC stock markets. When the data are divided into down and up market periods, herd information is found to be statistically significant and negative during upward market periods only. These results are similar to those reported in some emerging markets such as China, Japan and Hong Kong, where stock returns perform more similarly during down market periods and differently during rising markets.Design/methodology/approachThe authors present a brief literature on herd behaviour. Second, the authors provide some specificity of the GCC Islamic stock market, followed by the presentation of the methodology and the data, results and their interpretation.FindingsThe authors take into account the difference existing in market conditions and find evidence of herding behaviour during rising markets only for GCC markets. This result was confirmed after using the quantile regression method, as evidence of herding was observed only in highly extreme periods. Stock returns perform more similarly when market is down in Islamic GCC stock market.Research limitations/implicationsThe research limitation consists in the fact that this work can be extended to compare the GCC stock markets with other markets in Asia such as Malaysia and Indonesia.Practical implicationsThe principal implication consists in the fact that herding behaviour is limited in the GCC markets and Islamic finance can have an important contribution to moderate the behaviour in the financial markets.Social implicationsThe work focusses on the role of ethics in the financial markets and their ability to reduce the impact of behavioural biases.Originality/valueThe paper studies the behaviour of investors in the Islamic financial markets and gives an idea about the importance of the behaviour in this particular market regarding its characteristics.