Idiosyncratic Return Research Articles

The 2007–2009 financial crisis: changing market dynamics and the impact of credit supply and aggregate demand sensitivity

This article singles out the determinants of changes in US firms’ systematic risk and idiosyncratic return induced by the 2007–2009 financial crisis. After establishing that systematic risk changes during the crisis, the results show that higher operational and financial leverage coincide with an increase in systematic risk, while high cash availability is associated with a decrease in systematic risk. The crisis-induced idiosyncratic return worsens with increasing financial leverage, higher sensitivity to aggregate demand shocks and banking sector problems, and lower operational leverage. Additional results show that the aforementioned variables have economically large effects on firm performance during the crisis.

Idiosyncratic Investment Risk and Business Cycles

I show that, due to imperfect risk sharing, aggregate shocks to uncertainty about idiosyncratic return on investment generate economic contractions with elevated risk premia and a decrease in the risk-free rate. I present a tractable real business cycle model in which firms experience idiosyncratic shocks, to which managers are at least partially exposed; the distribution of these shocks is time-varying and stochastic. I show that the path for aggregate quantities, the price of physical capital, and the equity premium are the same as in a model without idiosyncratic risk, but with time-preference shocks. That is, in response to an increase in idiosyncratic uncertainty, the response of these variables is the same as if there were no idiosyncratic uncertainty but managers were suddenly reluctant to invest. However, time-preference and idiosyncratic uncertainty shocks are not isomorphic: an increase in idiosyncratic uncertainty leads to greater demand for precautionary saving and hence a decrease in the risk-free rate; in contrast, an increase in impatience has the opposite effect. In addition, with an idiosyncratic uncertainty shock, investment in physical capital can remain low even after the stock market and firm profitability recover, because managers cannot fully transfer idiosyncratic risk to diversified investors. Thus, shocks to idiosyncratic investment risk can explain, qualitatively, the aftermath of financial panics--elevated risk premia, a sharp and persistent decrease in investment, and a decrease in the risk-free rate. In a calibration, an increase in idiosyncratic investment risk similar to that experienced during the Great Recession leads firms to invest as if their cost of capital were 10 percentage points higher than the cost of capital implied by financial markets, and to a large decrease in the real risk-free rate.

Idiosyncratic investment risk and business cycles

I show that, due to imperfect risk sharing, aggregate shocks to uncertainty about idiosyncratic return on investment generate economic contractions with elevated risk premia and a decrease in the risk-free rate. I present a tractable real business cycle model in which firms experience idiosyncratic shocks, to which managers are at least partially exposed the distribution of these shocks is time-varying and stochastic. I show that the path for aggregate quantities, the price of physical capital, and the equity premium are the same as in a model without idiosyncratic risk, but with time-preference shocks. That is, in response to an increase in idiosyncratic uncertainty, the response of these variables is the same as if there were no idiosyncratic uncertainty but managers were suddenly reluctant to invest. However, time-preference and idiosyncratic uncertainty shocks are not isomorphic: an increase in idiosyncratic uncertainty leads to greater demand for precautionary saving and hence a decrease in the risk-free rate in contrast, an increase in impatience has the opposite effect. In addition, with an idiosyncratic uncertainty shock, investment in physical capital can remain low even after the stock market and firm profitability recover, because managers cannot fully transfer idiosyncratic risk to diversified investors. Thus, shocks to idiosyncratic investment risk can explain, qualitatively, the aftermath of financial panics--elevated risk premia, a sharp and persistent decrease in investment, and a decrease in the risk-free rate. In a calibration, an increase in idiosyncratic investment risk similar to that experienced during the Great Recession leads firms to invest as if their cost of capital were 10 percentage points higher than the cost of capital implied by financial markets, and to a large decrease in the real risk-free rate.

Corporate Social Responsibility and Downside Equity Tail Risk

This paper assesses the relationship between Corporate Social Responsibility and downside equity tail risk – a field of research that has so far been neglected - using world wide data for the period 2003-2011. Tail risk is estimated using Extreme Value Theory. Corporate Social Responsibility is approached using stakeholder theory. The results show that there are significant relationships between CSR and tail risk. These relationships are tested for robustness using a heterogeneous and homogeneous tail index, raw returns and idiosyncratic returns, and various values for the tail threshold. The relationships we found are sequential, which makes a causal relationship between CSR and tail risk plausible.

Asset Pricing with Return Asymmetries: Theory and Tests

I derive an equilibrium asset pricing model incorporating both systematic and idiosyncratic return asymmetries, and show their respective impact on expected returns. With systematic return asymmetry, investors allocate their wealth between the risk-free security, the market portfolio, and a factor which overweights assets with high systematic asymmetry. Investors who prefer positive asymmetry remain underdiversified from a mean-variance perspective to preserve skewness in their portfolio, and idiosyncratic asymmetry therefore is priced in equilibrium. I find that a systematic asymmetry factor and a factor capturing idiosyncratic asymmetry help explain the cross-sectional variation of expected returns across U.S. equities, international equity markets, government bonds, currencies, and commodities. My results offer a risk-based explanation of expected returns that contributes to our understanding of asset pricing across multiple markets.

Informed trade and idiosyncratic return variation

This paper explores the role of private information on idiosyncratic return variation. We suggest that there is a significant positive relationship between informed trade and firm-specific return variation. Using the probability of information-based trading (PIN) as a measure of informed trade, we find that the PIN is positively related to idiosyncratic return variation in both the level and the first-difference. The results imply that firm-specific return variation is induced by informed trade through information flow on price formation. Especially, we find a strong interaction effect between informed trade and trading volume. The impact of informed trade on firm-specific return variation is more profound for stocks with a high trading volume than for stocks with a low trading volume. The result suggests that trading activity plays an important role in the information revelation. The results of various robustness checks confirm that informed trade is an important determinant of idiosyncratic return variation.

A New Test for the Detection of the Pricing Role of Aggregate Idiosyncratic Risk in the Predictive Regression

The standard test for the pricing role of aggregate idiosyncratic risk in the conventional predictive regression considers aggregate total idiosyncratic risk a reasonable proxy for its undiversified component, which should be priced as theory suggests. However, when the priced component is relatively small, the test has little statistical power to reject the null hypothesis that idiosyncratic risk does not matter, even when the priced component, albeit small, explains an economically large portion of future excess return variation. We propose a simple regression-based method that can, under certain conditions, substantially improve the power of the test when economically important alternative hypotheses are true, but sacrifices little in the size of the test for the improved power. Based on the new test, we strongly reject the proposition that idiosyncratic risk does not matter and uncover a significantly positive relationship between aggregate undiversified idiosyncratic risk and future market excess returns.

Commercial Bank Failures During the Great Recession: The Real (Estate) Story

In the presence of innovations in risk-transfer technology in mortgage markets, during the run-up to the 2007-08 crisis U.S. commercial banks significantly raised their exposure to non-household real estate credit. This was the primary driver of the subsequent failures. Though non-trivial, the direct impact of fragile funding structures was economically smaller, and so was that of private-label MBS, which affected large banks only. I find no evidence that traditional home mortgages and agency MBS contributed to the failures. Both failed and survivor banks underpriced real estate risk ex-ante. Failed banks’ investments suffered both from low industry and from low idiosyncratic returns, but the latter cannot be solely explained by differences in the pace of accumulation of real estate exposure during the run-up to the crisis.

Accrual Quality, Skill, and the Cross-Section of Mutual Fund Returns

We use returns of actively managed mutual funds to estimate risk premiums associated with stock characteristics. Skilled fund managers can avoid stocks with deteriorating future fundamentals. As a result, when characteristics are associated with adverse news, fund returns reflect expected premiums better than stock returns. We use the pricing of accrual quality (AQ) as a setting to demonstrate the benefits of our approach. Prior research finds no significant AQ premiums in stock returns. In contrast, we document a significantly positive AQ premium in fund returns. This premium is especially large in portfolios selected by highly skilled managers. The premium is also present in a broad sample of individual stocks. Specifically, the loadings on the mutual-fund-based AQ factor explain the cross-section of stock returns. In additional tests, we document significant positive premiums for other characteristics that are “anomalously” negatively correlated with individual stock returns, including forecast dispersion and idiosyncratic return volatility.

Idiosyncratic Volatility, Measurement Frequency and Return Reversal

This paper examines whether the negative relation between idiosyncratic volatility and expected returns is due to stock return reversals as argued by Fu (2009) and Huang, Liu, Rhee and Zhang (2010). Controlling the return reversal effect, it shows that stocks with different past returns have different relations. The positive relation is mainly driven by stocks with low past returns, while the negative relation is result from stocks with high past returns. Additionally, the relation is very sensitive to the measurement frequency of idiosyncratic volatility, and the daily realized idiosyncratic volatility measure is a better proxy for the expected idiosyncratic volatility than the monthly measure. By employing an exponential generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedascticity-in-mean (EGARCH-M) model, this paper finds a strong positive relation between time-varying risk premium and idiosyncratic volatility for portfolios containing stocks with low past returns and small portfolio, and a negative relation for growth portfolio.

What Explains the Idiosyncratic Volatility in the Korean Stock Market?

Using the Fama and French (1993) three-factor model, this paper provides an explanation for the variation of idiosyncratic return in the Korean stock market over the period of 1990-2012. There had been an upward trend until 1999 in idiosyncratic volatility and its trend has been reversed afterwards. Our analysis yields three main results. Firstly, it appears that all four explanatory variables, two fundamentals related variables of the variance of return on equity and a proxy of growth options and two trading volume related variables of trading volume and foreign ownership ratio, explain considerable proportion of idiosyncratic return variation. Most interestingly, foreign investors have stabilizing effect on firm-specific risk in the Korean stock market. Secondly, a firm’s characteristics such as size and export orientation exert some influence on idiosyncratic volatility. Lastly, the absolute and relative explanatory powers of the four explanatory variables vary through time and diminish as the sample period ends, implying the need to search for further explanatory variables.

Money, financial stability and efficiency

Most analyses of banking crises assume that banks use real contracts. However, in practice contracts are nominal and this is what is assumed here. We consider a standard banking model with aggregate return risk, aggregate liquidity risk and idiosyncratic liquidity shocks. We show that, with non-contingent nominal deposit contracts, the first-best efficient allocation can be achieved in a decentralized banking system. What is required is that the central bank accommodates the demands of the private sector for fiat money. Variations in the price level allow full sharing of aggregate risks. An interbank market allows the sharing of idiosyncratic liquidity risk. In contrast, idiosyncratic (bank-specific) return risks cannot be shared using monetary policy alone; real transfers are needed.

Effects of differences of opinions and short‐sale constraints on the dual listed Chinese shares

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to study the effects of short‐sale constraints and differences of opinions on the price premium of dual listed Chinese A‐H shares.Design/methodology/approach – The analysis mainly follows the Miller's model, which indicates that the relaxation of stringent short‐sale constraint could reduce the upward bias in stock prices. Following the literature, the paper uses the idiosyncratic return volatility and monthly turnover rate as two main proxies of differences of opinions.Findings – This study shows that the high level of A‐share differences of opinions will lead to the high price premium of A‐share portfolio with the short‐sale constraint in the A‐share market. However, the high level of H‐share differences of opinions has no effect on the price premium of H‐share portfolio and has also positively contributed to the A‐share price premium. The price premium of shorted A‐share portfolio is declined more significantly than those of non‐shorted ones after the relaxation o...

ROY MODEL SORTING AND NONRANDOM SELECTION IN THE VALUATION OF A STATISTICAL LIFE*

Wage‐hedonics is used to recover the value of a statistical life (VSL) by exploiting the fact that workers choosing riskier occupations are compensated with a higher wage. Roy (Oxford Economic Papers 3 (1951), 135–46) suggests that observed wage distributions will be distorted if individuals choose jobs according to idiosyncratic returns. We describe how this type of sorting biases wage‐hedonic VSL estimates and implement two new estimation strategies that correct that bias. Using data from the Current Population Surveys, we recover VSL estimates that are three to four times larger than those based on the traditional techniques, statistically significant, and robust to a wide array of specifications.

Is There a Volatility Puzzle in the Hong Kong Stock Market?

Recent studies suggest an increasing trend in return idiosyncratic volatility and a ‘puzzling’ negative relationship between idiosyncratic and total volatility and stock returns. We investigate in an emerging market, the time-series behaviour of total and idiosyncratic volatility and their respective relationship with cross-sectional stock returns. First, we find that the time-series behaviour of both total and idiosyncratic volatility is episodic rather than exhibiting a long-term trend and that this episodic behaviour is driven by the level and variability of growth options. Second, we find a significant negative total volatility effect which reverses the apparent negative idiosyncratic volatility effect. Our results are consistent with a market populated by underdiversified risk-averse investors with a preference for high total volatility stocks. Consequently, we suggest that there is neither an idiosyncratic nor a total volatility puzzle. Our study underscores the importance of country verification, especially in emerging markets, of anomalies initially discovered in mature markets.

Do Stock Traders Learn from Experience? Evidence from an Emerging Market

Using a large representative sample of Indian retail equity investors, many of them new to the stock market, we show that both years of investment experience and feedback from investment returns have significant effects on investor behavior, favored stock styles, and performance. We identify two channels of feedback: performance relative to the market, and the directly-experienced returns to behavior and styles of stock. Both of these vary across investors at a point in time because investors are imperfectly diversified and receive idiosyncratic returns. We find that experienced investors generally behave in a manner more consistent with the recommendations of finance theory, although this tendency is weakened by strong investment performance. High trading profits increase turnover, while high returns to equity styles have a short-term negative and a longer-term positive effect on investors' style demands, possibly reflecting the offsetting effects of disposition bias and style chasing. We document high returns on a portfolio of stocks held by experienced investors, and on individual Indian stocks with an experienced and low-turnover investor base.

The Breakdown of Idiosyncratic Volatility Into Expected and Unexpected Components and Its Effects on Stock Returns in Brazil

ABSTRACT Based on studies of idiosyncratic volatility developed in the recent literature, this study analyzes its relation with expected returns through the breakdown of idiosyncratic volatility in the Brazilian stock market and presents evidence of the importance of expected idiosyncratic volatility for asset pricing. We study the impact of the expected and unexpected components of idiosyncratic volatility on the returns of shares listed on the BOVESPA between 2004 and 2011. The results show a strong positive and significant relation between expected idiosyncratic volatility and returns. This evidence is highlighted when we use unexpected idiosyncratic volatility to control for unexpected returns. Additional robustness tests, controlling for size and momentum effects, also have positive and significant coefficients, corroborating previous findings.

Consumption-Wealth Comovement of the Wrong Sign

An unexpected wealth windfall should increase consumption shortly after the windfall is received. We test this prediction using administrative records on over 40,000 401(k) accounts. Contrary to theory, we estimate a negative short-run marginal propensity to consume out of idiosyncratic 401(k) capital gains shocks. These results cannot be interpreted as standard intertemporal substitution, since the idiosyncratic returns we study do not predict future returns. Instead, our findings imply that many investors are influenced by a positive feedback effect, through which higher recent returns encourage higher short-run saving.

Investor Composition and Liquidity: An Analysis of Japanese Stocks

In the late 1990s, the Japanese government initiated a number of reforms that resulted in lower transaction costs and made the Japanese equity market more attractive for foreign institutions. Following these changes, foreign institutional holdings more than doubled, providing an opportunity to study how changes in the composition of investors affect market liquidity. Our analysis of a panel of firm-level ownership data indicates that Japanese stocks that are held more by foreign institutions tend to trade more actively, but are less liquid as measured by their quoted and effective bid-ask spreads, their short-term idiosyncratic volatilities and return reversals. To address endogeneity concerns we use index membership, the number of English news stories about Japanese companies, and their export to sales ratios as instruments for changes in foreign institutional holdings. We find that over the entire sample period, spreads and return reversals decrease less and idiosyncratic volatilities increase more for those stocks with higher foreign holdings.

Investor Underreaction and the Idiosyncratic Risk-Return Relation

Stocks with increases in idiosyncratic risk tend to earn low subsequent returns for a few months. However, high idiosyncratic risk stocks eventually earn persistently high returns. These results are consistent with positively priced idiosyncratic risk and temporary underreaction to idiosyncratic risk innovations. Because risk levels and innovations are correlated, the relation between historical idiosyncratic risk and returns may reect both risk premia and underreaction and yield misleading inference regarding the price of risk. The results reconcile previous work, which offers conflicting evidence on the price of idiosyncratic risk, and help to discriminate among explanations of the idiosyncratic risk-return relation.