Changes In VIX Research Articles

Fear, extreme fear and U.S. stock market returns

This paper investigates the multiscale co-movement between the levels and changes in VIX and SKEW indices and the returns of the S&P 500 market indices at the aggregate and sector levels of data. By utilizing the wavelet localized multiple correlation (WLMC) method over the most recent time period (January 3, 2006 - October 26, 2023), we demonstrate that very short-term market participants, such as traders and speculators, are watchful about the combined information from the VIX and SKEW levels; while the changes in VIX and SKEW are more informative for stock returns in the medium- to long-term, which should concern the decisions of investors and portfolio managers. We also show that VIX in general exerts a more dominant influence on the S&P 500 Index returns than SKEW, but more for VIX changes than for VIX levels. The very short-run informativeness of VIX and SKEW for stock returns is markedly pronounced around the European debt crisis (2012) and the COVID-19 meltdown (2020). The stock sector analysis reveals that defensive sectors are sensitive to the SKEW index, whereas the cyclical sectors are predominantly related to the fluctuations in the VIX index. Overall, our findings provide useful new insights into the stock market sentiment and the resulting market participants’ behavior at the market microstructure level. As such, they may be of interest not only to traders and investors, but also to financial analysts and government policy-makers in their attempts to understand the multiscale relationship between monetary policy and the stock market.

VIX to S&P 500 Correlation Over the Weekend: Are Market Makers Using S&P 500 Weekend Returns to Price VIX on Monday Morning?

This paper studied the correlation between the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) weekend returns and the VIX changes. Two distinct patterns are found: (1) VIX is dropping intraday and rising overnight; (2) a negative SPY weekend return correlates with VIX weekend change. We found the negative correlation is statistically significant (P=0.000). This proves that option market makers are using SPY Friday overnight returns to adjust the implied volatility the next morning. This may lead to a profitable options model that sells high IV options closing on Friday and buys them back next Monday, especially before the earnings announcement.

Stock and oil price returns in international markets: Identifying short and long-run effects

This paper examines how stock returns respond to oil prices with monthly data from 1990 to 2020 for 12 major economies: 6 oil-exporting countries and 6 oil-importing countries. Combining short and long-run empirical approaches in country-by-country analyses, we first document varying effects of oil price returns in the short-term, while increases in volatility (changes in VIX or geopolitical risk) have negative effects on stock markets. Dynamic OLS (DOLS) estimators show in the long-run positive oil price effects on stock markets for oil-exporters and relatively weaker negative evidence for oil-importers. Interest rate increases have strong negative effects in the long run. Panel analyses shed further light on these results along with structural breaks. Our findings suggest complementary insights from the DOLS long-run approach: oil prices and bond yields have expected signs and volatility has mixed effects on stock markets.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12197-022-09602-x.

Remarks on the behaviour of financial market efficiency during the COVID-19 pandemic. The case of VIX

This paper investigates the Chicago Board Option Exchange Volatility Index's (‘VIX’) response to the COVID-19 pandemic crisis, in terms of information efficiency. First, we estimate an Efficiency Index over rolling windows, based on closing levels, for a period between 1995-01-03 and 2020-12-30. Second, we check for the presence of deterministic chaos in efficiency series, by using the largest Lyapunov exponent and sample, as well as permutation entropy. However, we do not find that these estimators provide a clear evidence of a substantial change in VIX's efficiency during 2020, in terms of deterministic chaos and irregular dynamics.

Breaking VIX at open: Evidence of uncertainty creation and resolution

Abstract We decompose daily (close-to-close) changes of VIX into overnight (close-to-open) and trading-hour (open-to-close) changes. Consistent with the notion that non-trading creates uncertainty and trading resolves uncertainty, we find that on average VIX increases overnight and decreases during trading hours. More importantly, we document an important seasonality in VIX, i.e., the non-trading day effect. Overnight increase of VIX involving weekends or holidays is significantly higher than that over two consecutive trading days. We also document that VIX exhibits a clear pattern around pre-scheduled overnight and trading-hour macroeconomic announcement. Finally, we show that breaking VIX changes into overnight and trading-hour components and incorporating the non-trading day effect lead to not only significant improvements in in-sample fitting but also superior performance of out-of-sample-forecasting and active trading strategies.

The impact of monetary policy on option-implied stock market expectations

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meetings and the changes of the target rates on stock market uncertainty.Design/methodology/approachMultivariate regression analysis is applied to the historical data of VIX, FOMC meetings and target rates. Subtle relations are revealed by further categorizing the FOMC meetings into being scheduled and unscheduled and distinguishing the signs of the changes in VIX and target rates. CPI and the prime rate are used for robustness test.FindingsThe authors first examine the relation between FOMC meetings and target surprises; the results indicate that unscheduled FOMC meetings heavily impact the target surprises. Then, the authors investigate the relation between FOMC meetings and VIX changes; the results show that both unscheduled and scheduled FOMC meetings impact VIX, where the impacts of scheduled FOMC meetings are more substantial. The authors also analyze the responses of VIX to the target surprises, and the results reveal that there is an asymmetric effect of target surprises on VIX, where the influences of the scheduled positive target surprises are more significant. Finally, by examining the relation between the FOMC meeting and the risk-neutral density of the VIX option, the authors conclude that both KURT and SKEW are more affected by unscheduled FOMC meetings.Originality/valueDeeper dimensions of the relations between VIX, FOMC meetings and target rates are analyzed and more insightful understandings of such relations are gained.

Extreme spillovers of VIX fear index to international equity markets

This study analyzes the impact of VIX spillovers on market activities during extreme market conditions in 42 international equity markets from 1998 to 2014. Specifically, tail cross-dependence suggests that a small change in VIX significantly influences global market activities during extreme market conditions. The impact of VIX is asymmetric, which is more pronounced in bearish, highly volatile, and low trading volume markets. Moreover, VIX spillovers exhibit a stronger impact on returns in developed markets and on volatility in emerging markets. In terms of geographical location, the impact of VIX spillovers is more pronounced on returns in Europe and on volatility in Latin America. These findings indicate that international investors can potentially benefit from international portfolio diversification and can serve as useful guidance to policymakers in designing appropriate policies.

Interrelations of U.S. market fears and emerging markets returns: Global evidence

AbstractWe investigate the interrelations between U.S. stock market uncertainty (VIX) and equity returns in several emerging markets (EMs) in an integrated multivariate system that allows the interactions through the first and second moments of VIX and return processes. Our VARMAX‐CCC‐QGARCH model finds significant interactions in the covariance terms of VIX and EM returns, which facilitate risk transmission. Changes in VIX negatively affect EM returns, which also significantly affect VIX changes. We find that VIX changes and EM returns collectively have predictive ability for each other. Further, VIX shocks contribute 22–42% to the prediction error of EM returns. Our results underscore the importance of capturing interactions between VIX changes and EM returns through their variance–covariance matrix and have important implications for global diversification, flight‐to‐safety choices, and hedging the cross‐market risks.

The Effect of Volatility Expectations on Large Stock Price Changes

<p><em>My study explores the effect of future volatility expectations, embedded in VIX index, on large daily stock price changes and on subsequent stock returns. Following both psychological and financial literature claiming that good (bad) mood may cause people to perceive positive (negative) future outcomes as more probable and that the changes in the value of VIX may be negatively correlated with contemporaneous investors’ mood, I hypothesize that if a major positive (negative) stock price move takes place on a day when the value of VIX falls (rises), then its magnitude may be amplified by positive (negative) investors’ mood, creating price overreaction to the initial company-specific shock, which may result in subsequent price reversal. In line with my hypothesis, I document that both positive and negative large price moves accompanied by the opposite-sign contemporaneous changes in VIX are followed by significant reversals on the next two trading days and over five- and twenty-day intervals following the event, the magnitude of the reversals increasing over longer post-event windows, while large stock price changes taking place on the days when the value of VIX moves in the same direction are followed by non-significant price drifts. The results remain robust after accounting for additional company (size, beta, historical volatility) and event-specific (stock’s return and trading volume on the event day) factors, and are stronger for small and volatile stocks.</em></p>

The Effect of Volatility Expectations on Large Stock Price Changes

<p><em>My study explores the effect of future volatility expectations, embedded in VIX index, on large daily stock price changes and on subsequent stock returns. Following both psychological and financial literature claiming that good (bad) mood may cause people to perceive positive (negative) future outcomes as more probable and that the changes in the value of VIX may be negatively correlated with contemporaneous investors’ mood, I hypothesize that if a major positive (negative) stock price move takes place on a day when the value of VIX falls (rises), then its magnitude may be amplified by positive (negative) investors’ mood, creating price overreaction to the initial company-specific shock, which may result in subsequent price reversal. In line with my hypothesis, I document that both positive and negative large price moves accompanied by the opposite-sign contemporaneous changes in VIX are followed by significant reversals on the next two trading days and over five- and twenty-day intervals following the event, the magnitude of the reversals increasing over longer post-event windows, while large stock price changes taking place on the days when the value of VIX moves in the same direction are followed by non-significant price drifts. The results remain robust after accounting for additional company (size, beta, historical volatility) and event-specific (stock’s return and trading volume on the event day) factors, and are stronger for small and volatile stocks.</em></p>

Relief Rallies after FOMC Announcements as a Resolution of Uncertainty

Abstract We find substantial positive average stock returns after FOMC announcements accompanied by the release of the Summary of Economic Projections (SEP) and press conference by the Fed Chair. Both SEPs and press conferences contain new information that moves financial markets. We show that several measures of uncertainty are significantly higher on days of FOMC announcements accompanied by SEP and press conference than on announcement days without SEP and press conference. Controlling for changes in uncertainty measured by VIX changes, the positive unconditional mean returns after the FOMC announcements with SEP and press conference disappear. We also find that stocks correlated with market uncertainty shocks have higher returns on days of FOMC meetings with SEP and press conference. These results suggest that the positive post-announcement stock market returns are related to resolution of uncertainty.

Industry Rotation and Time-Varying Sensitivity by VIX

In this article, the authors, one of whom was a doctoral student of Stephen A. Ross, investigate the cross section of industry returns and the effect of uncertainty as proxied by the VIX index. They find that different moments of the distribution of cross-sectional returns for industries are significantly correlated to both the change in VIX and the level of VIX. Furthermore, the size effect diminishes after controlling for the industry effect. The sensitivity to the change in VIX is time varying. Different VIX regimes and different events can alter industry sensitivities. Non-stationarity of the sensitivity may also introduce complexity on factor or smart beta strategies, which tilt toward a favorable risk premium factor. Finally, the authors propose a general approach for industry rotation.

Revising Equity Valuation with Tail Risk

When VIX—a market index of volatility—increases, a firm’s response is to defer growth of investment. Simultaneously, the expected time to ruin, E ( T ), shortens, causing the firm’s value to decline more than commonly used valuation models suggest. The authors derive the characteristics of E ( T ) and revise valuation models that assume cash flows are growing perpetuities. They find that “value trap,” high-growth stocks, and “irrational exuberance” can be explained by incorporating E ( T ) into the traditional valuation models. Their empirical results show that the sensitivities of the 49 industry portfolios to the change in VIX are all significantly negative and undiversifiable and could be proxies for E ( T ).

Hitting SKEW for SIX

In this study, we propose “SIX” as a new forward-looking index of negative market skew derived from state-preference pricing. Specifically, SIX is a forecast of the ratio of lower to upper partial moment volatility over a 30-day horizon, for SPX market returns. Using SPX options data from 1996 to 2013, we conduct a comparison between SIX and the CBOE SKEW index. First, we document that the daily change in VIX and SIX (SKEW) are negatively (positively) related. Second, we show that the daily change of SIX (SKEW) adds (does not add) significant explanatory power for predicting the one-day ahead return. Third, though biased, SIX produces an efficient forecast of future physical skewness. In contrast, there is no statistically significant relationship between SKEW and physical skewness. Collectively, our results suggest that as an indicator of institutional anxiety, both theoretically and in practice, SIX (SKEW) is a more than useful (questionable) complement to VIX.

Examining the flight-to-safety with the implied volatilities

This paper investigates the flight-to-safety phenomenon by examining the interactions between the stock market volatility (VIX) and volatilities of the Treasury note, gold, and silver markets. We find that increases in VIX lead to contemporaneous and delayed increases in the volatilities of T-note, gold, and silver prices. The VIX Granger causes the volatilities of T-note, gold, and silver markets, but the latter volatilities do not predict the stock market volatility. Changes in VIX explain more of volatility increases in T-note and gold prices during the financial crisis than in other periods. The leading positive effect of VIX on other expected volatilities, along with the possible negative asset correlations, complements the cross-market hedging and is consistent with the flight-to-safety phenomenon.

Tail Wags Dog: Intraday Price Discovery in VIX Markets

Beginning with VIX futures in 2004, followed by VIX options in 2006 and VIX ETPs in 2009, the daily open interest in volatility contracts is now in the tens of billions of dollars. Given this growth, it is important to develop a better understanding of price discovery and the supply/demand dynamics in each market. Some of the price relations are linked by arbitrage. Others are not. In particular, the relation between the VIX cash index and the VIX futures is not arbitraged, and we show that, where once VIX changes led VIX futures price changes, the VIX futures now leads. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Jrl Fut Mark 37:431–451, 2017

The Effect of US Stock Market Uncertainty on Emerging Market Returns

ABSTRACTWe investigate the effects of US stock market uncertainty (VIX) on the stock returns in Latin America and aggregate emerging markets before, during, and after the financial crisis. We find that increases in VIX lead to significant immediate and delayed declines in emerging market returns in all periods. However, changes in VIX explained a greater percentage of changes in emerging market returns during the financial crisis than in other periods. The higher US stock market uncertainty exerts a much stronger depressing effect on emerging market returns than their own-lagged and regional returns. Our risk transmission model suggests that a heightened US stock market uncertainty lowers emerging market returns by both reducing the mean returns and raising the variance of returns. The VIX fears raise the volatility of emerging market returns through generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH)-type volatility transmission processes.

Practical Applications of VIX versus Size

What explains the cross-section of returns in the US equity market? <b>Maggie Copeland</b> and <b>Thomas Copeland</b>, Co-Founders of <b>Copeland Valuation Consultants</b>, say that changes in VIX can explain stock returns. Their research shows that forward implied volatility, as measured by the VIX Index, is a key determinant,statistically more important than market cap. The VIX—the “fear gauge”—is a commonly used measure of market risk, a contrarian indicator that spikes when the stock market declines. Using a data sample from the period 2000–2011, the authors find that when the VIX has a positive move, large-cap stocks outperform small-cap stocks, and viceversa. Their finding debunks the commonly held assumption that the size effect always holds true.

An Analysis of the VIX Volatility Index on the US Treasuries, Specifically During the Periods of Quantitative Easing

Volatility is a concern of many investors. In turbulent financial times there can be a flight from the equity market to treasury bonds in order to provide greater security, liquidity and guarantee of returns. Calculated as a weighted average of put and call options on the SP across models the change in VIX was predictive of the change in treasury. The model examination determined that in the model that included the autoregressive and moving average provided the most accurate results.

U.S. stock market uncertainty and cross-market European stock returns

We investigate the cross-market differential relations of U.S. stock market uncertainty (VIX) with U.S. and European stock market returns before and during the European equity market crisis. Also, we examine whether VIX has predictive ability with respect to short-run European stock market returns. We find a strong negative contemporaneous relation between VIX changes and European stock returns that was twice as large during the equity market crisis period than before it. Changes in VIX have significant predictive ability for daily returns in the major European equity markets during the European equity market crisis period but not before it. The VIX fears persist longer in European markets than in the U.S. market, suggesting market frictions and limitations in information-processing capabilities of investors.