Optimal Noise in Asset-Price Manipulation

There are two commonly recognized anomalies in the stock market, namely short-run momentum and long-run reversals. Under these two financial market anomalies, there are two trading strategies – momentum trading and contrarian trading – that can be adopted for the purpose of making profits. We model an asset market in which momentum traders, contrarian traders and informed rational speculators make transactions. We discovered that under certain conditions, the self-profiting motive of informed speculators will lead to their price manipulation behaviors, and result in momentum and reversals phenomenon on the asset price. We also found that the scenario of the relative quantity of the two types of behavioral traders and their profit margins is similar to that of a minority game.

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The Micro and Macro of Managerial Beliefs

10.31235/osf.io/fctsb ◽

2020 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Jose Maria Barrero

Keyword(s):

Rational Expectations ◽

Asset Price ◽

Heterogeneous Firms ◽

Adjustment Costs ◽

Consumer Welfare ◽

Sales Growth ◽

Firm Level ◽

Managerial Decisions ◽

Managerial Beliefs ◽

Growth Volatility

This paper studies how biases in managerial beliefs affect managerial decisions, firm performance, and the macroeconomy. Using a new survey of US managers I establish three facts. (1) Managers are not over-optimistic: sales growth forecasts on average do not exceed realizations. (2) Managers are overprecise (overconfident): they underestimate future sales growth volatility. (3) Managers overextrapolate: their forecasts are too optimistic after positive shocks and too pessimistic after negative shocks. To quantify the implications of these facts, I estimate a dynamic general equilibrium model in which managers of heterogeneous firms use a subjective beliefs process to make forward-looking hiring decisions. Overprecision and overextrapolation lead managers to overreact to firm-level shocks and overspend on adjustment costs, destroying 2.1 percent of the typical firm’s value. Pervasive overreaction leads to excess volatility and reallocation, lowering consumer welfare by 0.5 to 2.3 percent relative to the rational expectations equilibrium. These findings suggest overreaction may amplify asset-price and business cycle fluctuations.

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