Political risks and financial markets: emerging vs developed economies

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Bechir Ben Ghozzi ◽  
Hasna Chaibi

PurposeThe authors provide a comparative analysis between emerging and developed financial markets in terms of the effects of political risks on stock market returns and volatility. The authors also examine whether this impact depends on the nature of political risks. Therefore, this study aims to detect which financial markets are the most profitable and the riskiest in terms of political risks.Design/methodology/approachThe authors investigate the impact of political risks on the excess stock market return and its conditional volatility using the generalized ARCH model for a sample of 46 developed and emerging markets over a period ranging from 1995 to 2019. In order to test how the nature of political risks affects equity excess returns and volatility differently in different markets, the authors employ (1) a composite political risk score, (2) the four subgroups of political risks as defined by Bekaert et al. (2005, 2014) and (3) the individual dimensions of political risks.FindingsThe findings indicate that the composite political risk is priced into both stock markets. The effect of political risks is positive for excess returns and negative for volatility. The authors show that the political risk leads to more volatility in developed markets. Nevertheless, the effect of individual components varies according to the market category.Practical implicationsThe authors provide a framework for predicting market returns and volatility using changes in the political risk of the country. The findings help investors make investment decisions based on the political decisions of governments. In other words, investors should consider political uncertainty when determining their expected earnings.Originality/valueThe authors engage monthly panel data methodology in terms of the political risk stock market relationship. In addition, the authors consider recent and very long data covering the period 1995–2019. Furthermore, this study combines three various political risk measures, and both equity returns and volatility.

2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (8) ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanjeev Prashar ◽  
Lokesh Haridoss ◽  
V. Jagadeesh Kumar ◽  
Rashmi Kumar Aggarwal

Subject area Business environment, international business management. Study level/applicability The case is suitable for students of the business environment, and of international business management. Case overview The case revolves around the reaction of the Finance Ministry of India on Vodafone's tax case and its implications on FDI and the foreign investors who are investing in India. The core issue is the political risk(s) faced by Vodafone even after having won the tax case in the Supreme Court, the highest judiciary body in India. The Government of India has amended the law to bring the tax into retrospective mode and it signifies the impact of political decisions on business organizations. Expected learning outcomes The case can aid in understanding the effects of changes in a political system and legal framework on the efficacy of business entities; and the importance of, and intricacies involved in, the formulation of political risk mitigating strategies while entering into new markets. The key learning outcomes are: understanding various types of political risks faced by multinationals; assessing the political risks involved in foreign investments; and appreciating the possible mitigating strategies to handle such risks. Supplementary materials Teaching notes are available, please consult your librarian for access.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Slah Bahloul ◽  
Nawel Ben Amor

PurposeThis paper investigates the relative importance of local macroeconomic and global factors in the explanation of twelve MENA (Middle East and North Africa) stock market returns across the different quantiles in order to determine their degree of international financial integration.Design/methodology/approachThe authors use both ordinary least squares and quantile regressions from January 2007 to January 2018. Quantile regression permits to know how the effects of explanatory variables vary across the different states of the market.FindingsThe results of this paper indicate that the impact of local macroeconomic and global factors differs across the quantiles and markets. Generally, there are wide ranges in degree of international integration and most of MENA stock markets appear to be weakly integrated. This reveals that the portfolio diversification within the stock markets in this region is still beneficial.Originality/valueThis paper is original for two reasons. First, it emphasizes, over a fairly long period, the impact of a large number of macroeconomic and global variables on the MENA stock market returns. Second, it examines if the relative effects of these factors on MENA stock returns vary or not across the market states and MENA countries.


Author(s):  
Mustapha Chaffai ◽  
Imed Medhioub

Purpose This 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/approach The 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. Findings The 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/implications The 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 implications The 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 implications The work focusses on the role of ethics in the financial markets and their ability to reduce the impact of behavioural biases. Originality/value The 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.


Author(s):  
Neşe Algan ◽  
Mehmet Balcılar ◽  
Harun Bal ◽  
Müge Manga

This study investigates the impact of terrorism on the Turkish financial market using daily data from Jan 4, 1988 to May 24, 2016. In order to measure the impacts of terrorist attacks in Turkey we test for causality from terrorism index to returns and volatilities of 3 aggregate and 16 sector level stock indices using a recently developed nonparametric causality-in-test test of Balcilar et al. (2016). The results obtained indicate that there is no causality from terrorist activities to stock market returns (1st moment). However, we find significant causality at various quantiles from terrorist activates to volatility (2nd moment) of tourism, food and basic materials sectors.


Author(s):  
Yousra Trichilli ◽  
Mouna Boujelbène Abbes ◽  
Afif Masmoudi

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the capability of the hidden Markov model using Googling investors’ sentiments to predict the dynamics of Islamic indexes’ returns in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) financial markets from 2004 to 2018. Design/methodology/approach The authors propose a hidden Markov model based on the transition matrix to apprehend the relationship between investor’s sentiment and Islamic index returns. The proposed model facilitates capturing the uncertainties in Islamic market indexes and the possible effects of the dynamics of Islamic market on the persistence of these regimes or States. Findings The bearish state is the most persistent sentiment with the longest duration for all the MENA Islamic markets except for Jordan, Morocco and Qatar. In addition, the obtained results indicate that the effect of sentiment on predicting the future Islamic index returns is conditional on the MENA States. Besides, the estimated mean returns for each state indicates that the bullish and calm states are ideal for investing in Islamic indexes of Bahrain, Oman, Morocco, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates. However, only the bullish state is ideal for investing Islamic indexes of Jordan, Egypt and Qatar. Research limitations/implications This paper has used data at a monthly frequency that can explain only short-term dynamics between Googling investor’s sentiment and the MENA Islamic stock market returns. Moreover, this work can be done on the stock markets while taking into account the specificity of each activity sector. Practical implications In fact, the findings of this paper are helpful for academics, analysts and practitioners, and more specifically for the Islamic MENA financial investors. Moreover, this study provides useful insights not only into the duration of the relationship between the indexes’ returns and the investors’ sentiments in the five states but also into the transition probabilities which have implications for how investors could be guided in their choice of future investment in a portfolio with Islamic indexes. Findings of this paper are important and valuable for policy-makers and investors. Thus, predicting the effect of Googling investors’ sentiment on the MENA Islamic stock market dynamics is important for portfolio diversification by domestic and international investors. Moreover, the results of this paper gave new insights into financial analysts about the dynamic relationship between Googling investors’ sentiment and Islamic stock market returns across market regimes. Therefore, the findings of this study might be useful for investors as they help them capture the unobservable dynamics of the changes in the investors’ sentiment regimes in the MENA financial markets to make successful investment decisions. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first to use the hidden Markov model to examine changes in the Islamic index return dynamics across five market sentiment states, namely the depressed sentiment (S1), the bullish sentiment (S2), the bearish sentiment (S3), the calm sentiment (S4) and the bubble sentiment (S5).


2016 ◽  
Vol 42 (8) ◽  
pp. 817-829 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kenneth M Washer ◽  
Srinivas Nippani ◽  
Robert R Johnson

Purpose – Several articles in the popular press have detailed an end-of-year anomaly known as the Santa Claus Rally, a period best defined as the last five trading days of December and the first two trading days of January. The purpose of this paper is to examine US stock market returns over this period from 1926 to 2014. Design/methodology/approach – The authors examine the Santa Claus Rally by relating it to firm size in the stock markets of the USA. The Santa Claus Rally consists of the last five trading days in December and the first two in January. The authors use t-tests, non-parametric test and regression analysis to determine if investors in small firms get superior returns over the period 1926-2014. Findings – The authors find that returns are generally higher during the period and that the effect is considerably stronger for small-firm portfolios relative to large capitalization portfolios. The authors also provide convincing evidence that the three most important trading days (especially for small stock portfolios) are the last trading day in December and the first two trading days in January. Research limitations/implications – The authors only check the markets in the USA. Market makers can use this to get significantly high returns during the Christmas-New Year period. The study shows for the first time that there is a size effect as part of the Santa Claus Rally. Practical implications – This is the first study to show that Santa Claus Rally exists for a long time in the USA. It is the first study to show that there is a size effect in Santa Claus Rally. Market participants could get significantly higher returns by investing or being invested in the stock market during this period. Social implications – The impact of the holiday season on stock market returns. Originality/value – This is the first major academic study to examine Santa Claus Rally in this much detail. The authors not only show that the rally exists, the authors show that it is based on firm size and has been in existence for nearly 90 years in the USA.


2018 ◽  
Vol 44 (12) ◽  
pp. 1434-1445
Author(s):  
Chu-Sheng Tai

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to provide empirical evidence on how 1999–2001 dot-com crisis and 2007–2009 subprime crisis affect the gains from international diversification from the perspective of US investors. Design/methodology/approach A conditional international CAPM with asymmetric multivariate GARCH-M specification is used to estimate international diversification gains. Findings The authors find that over the entire sample period, the average gains from international diversification is statistically significant and about 1.253 percent per year. During the subprime crisis period, the average gains decreases to about 0.567 percent per year, but it increases to 2.829 percent per year during the dot-com crisis. Research limitations/implications These research findings although confirm the conjectures that international financial turmoil tends to increase the co-movements among global financial markets, are in contrast to the conjectures that international diversification does not work during the financial crisis as evidence from the dot-com crisis. Therefore, future research on international diversification should not just focus on the correlation among international financial markets and should adopt a fully parameterized asset pricing model to study this research topic. Practical implications Given the empirical results found in this paper that international diversification gains may be decreasing or increasing during the financial crisis, as long as investors are not able to predict international financial crises, it is the average gains from international diversification over the longer periods that should encourage investors to diversify, regardless of potentially lower benefits over the shorter periods of time. Originality/value The major value of this paper is that although the increase in the conditional correlation during the financial turmoil is consistent with previous studies, the empirical results clearly show that the impact of a financial crisis on the gains from international diversification cannot be solely determined by the correlation between domestic and world stock market returns since the gains also depend on the unsystematic risk from the domestic stock market. Consequently, it is premature for previous studies to conclude that the gain from international diversification is diminishing due to an increasing correlation among international stock markets during the financial crisis.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 338-367 ◽  
Author(s):  
Huiqiang Wang

Purpose Prior studies have paid close attention to the impact of political risk on financial markets. Following this strand of literature, this paper aims to focus on the causality link between political shocks and their impacts on emerging stock markets. Design/methodology/approach This paper highlights an innovative counterfactual model for political risk assessment. Based on a natural experiment, i.e. the Taiwan Strait Crisis in 1995-1996, this study utilizes one data-driven approach, e.g. the synthetic control methods (SCMs), to estimate causal impact of this political shock on Taiwan’s stock market. Findings Major findings in this study are consistent with existing literature on the price of political risk, e.g. political uncertainty commands a risk premium. The SCM estimations suggest that Taiwan’s stock prices dramatically underperformed its newly industrialized peers and other developed markets during the crisis. The SCM results are statistically significant and robust to various cross-validation tests. Research limitations/implications Findings in this study indicate that political risks could generate enormous impacts on emerging financial markets. In particular, political uncertainty following new geopolitical dynamics requires proper identification and assessment. Originality/value To the author’s knowledge, this paper is the first rigorous counterfactual study to the causality relationship between political uncertainty and stock prices in emerging markets. This paper is distinct from previous studies in applying a data-driven approach to combine the features of learning from others (cross-sectional) and learning from the past (time series).


2022 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sumaira Chamadia ◽  
Mobeen Ur Rehman ◽  
Muhammad Kashif

PurposeIt has been demonstrated in the US market that expected market excess returns can be predicted using the average higher-order moments of all firms. This study aims to empirically test this theory in emerging markets.Design/methodology/approachTwo measures of average higher moments have been used (equal-weighted and value-weighted) along with the market moments to predict subsequent aggregate excess returns using the linear as well as the quantile regression model.FindingsThe authors report that both equal-weighted skewness and kurtosis significantly predict subsequent market returns in two countries, while value-weighted average skewness and kurtosis are significant in predicting returns in four out of nine sample markets. The results for quantile regression show that the relationship between the risk variable and aggregate returns varies along the spectrum of conditional quantiles.Originality/valueThis is the first study that investigates the impact of third and fourth higher-order average realized moments on the predictability of subsequent aggregate excess returns in the MSCI Asian emerging stock markets. This study is also the first to analyze the sensitivity of future market returns over various quantiles.


2019 ◽  
Vol 37 (5) ◽  
pp. 610-626 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin Jones

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to consider the role of political risk in real estate and to specifically examine the implications in Scotland of continuing uncertainty caused by political events. Design/methodology/approach The primary research links the political timeline around the Scottish independence referendum in 2014 to time series of a combination of individual investment transactions, measures of sentiment from investment agents and yields. The analysis distinguishes between UK and overseas investors. Findings The political risk over six years ebbed and flowed with the changing probability of constitutional change but ultimately it has been a cumulative dampener on investment in Scotland. An element of the political risk can be deemed to be specific risk linked to UK institutional fund mandates that stems from concerns about possible forced sales with independence. In addition political risk is in the eye of the beholder with overseas investors in Scotland unfazed by the prospects of independence. Practical implications The short-term impact on investment of the Scottish “neverendum” is very similar to that for independence. The consequences are depressed investment and development that seem set to continue at least until the constitutional hiatus begins to be resolved. Originality/value This is the first study to explicitly examine the impact of political uncertainty on the real estate sector.


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