Predictability of the Realised Volatility of International Stock Markets Amid Uncertainty Related to Infectious Diseases

In the context of the great turmoil in the financial markets caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the predictability of daily infectious diseases-related uncertainty (EMVID) for international stock markets volatilities is examined using heterogeneous autoregressive realised variance (HAR-RV) models. A recursive estimation approach in the short-, medium- and long-run out-of-sample predictability is considered and the main findings show that the EMVID index plays a significant role in forecasting the volatility of international stock markets. Furthermore, the results suggest that the most vulnerable stock markets to EMVID are those in Singapore, Portugal and The Netherlands. The implications of these results for investors and portfolio managers amid high levels of uncertainty resulting from infectious diseases are discussed.

Design of Portfolio using Multivariate Analysis

Stock markets are considered a barometer of the respective country’s economy around the world. Modern portfolio theory advocates diversification for risk management, which helps maintain returns as long as indices around the world are not perfectly correlated. The relationship exists across markets; as a result, co-movement has drawn the attention of individual investors and portfolio managers for the construction of their portfolios to maximize returns for a given level of risk. The study of co-movements provides inputs for portfolio construction and facilitates the identification of markets where indices may move in the same direction or the opposite direction and the country’s stock markets that are not correlated. A review of the literature revealed that statistical tools like Correlation, Factor analysis, and Granger causality test, etc., are some of the tools that can be used to understand co-movements of markets. Alan harper et al. (2012) study used principle component analysis and inferred that Indian stock returns are aligned with its trading partners and concluded that maximizing the investors’ returns by reducing the risk. Tak Kee Hui concluded that factor analysis provides inputs for selecting foreign markets for risk diversification. This study examines the potential for diversification using 22 world stock market indices using multivariate analysis.

Examination of Long Memory in Indian Stock Market: A Sectoral Juxtaposition

One of the situations encountered in time series analysis is long-range dependence, also known as Long memory. We investigated the presence of long memory in the Indian sectoral indices returns and investigated whether the long memory behaviour is affected by the data frequency. We applied the autoregressive fractionally integrated moving average (ARFIMA) models to 13 sectoral indices of the National Stock Exchange of India and examined the long memory in daily, monthly and quarterly return series. The results indicate the persistence in daily return series and anti-persistence in monthly and quarterly return series. Thus, we conclude that the frequency of data does have a significant effect on the behaviour of long memory patterns. The results will be helpful for present and potential investors, institutional investors, portfolio managers and policymakers to understand the dynamic nature of long memory in the Indian stock market.

Analysis of diversification benefits for cryptocurrency portfolios before and during the COVID-19 pandemic

Purpose This study aims to investigate the diversification benefits attached to the crypto portfolios when combined with stocks, Forex instruments and commodity assets. Design/methodology/approach Markowitz diversification techniques have been used to analyze the risk-return tradeoffs of the individual portfolios. Daily prices on cryptocurrencies and the selected asset classes, cover the period before and during the pandemic COVID-19. The portfolio risk of the portfolios was calculated by identical techniques and analyzed with equal criteria. Findings The results with 270 trails indicate that stocks on average reduce the portfolio risk of crypto portfolios by 36% followed by fiat currency with 30.9% and commodities by 20.8%. Average daily returns stand in line with the standard portfolio theories where riskier portfolios offer higher returns and the other way around. Originality/value The authors contribute to the current literature by investigating the portfolio risk attached to the crypto portfolios when stocks, commodities and Forex instruments were added separately. To this end, results inform not only retail investors but also portfolio managers on the asset classes that generate better optimization for crypto portfolios.

ALTERNATIVE OPTIONS FOR THE PLACEMENT OF ASSETS OF THE UNIFIED ACCUMULATIVE PENSION FUND

In this situation, the peculiarity of managing pension assets is that there are certain requirements for the structure of the investment portfolio, that is, the introduction of preliminary restrictions on the upper share of various categories of instruments in the investment portfolio. They are: by assets, by risk, by concentration of ownership, by issuer and by type of securities. Therefore, in the process of forming a portfolio of assets (shares), assets with the least volatility are selected, i.e. the initial goal is to preserve assets, then profitability. In this regard, investment portfolio managers need to create a structure of liquid financial instruments that can be converted into cash in a very short period of time and receive a stable income with a reasonable level of risk, and make the right decision, carefully comparing them with alternative financial instruments. ... The effectiveness of such strategies often depends on the ability to prioritize investment activities and combine objectives and core principles. The goal is to ensure the safety of investments.

Hedging and Evaluating Tail Risks via Two Novel Options Based on Type II Extreme Value Distribution

Tail risk is an important financial issue today, but directly hedging tail risks with an ad hoc option is still an unresolved problem since it is not easy to specify a suitable and asymmetric pricing kernel. By defining two ad hoc underlying “assets”, this paper designs two novel tail risk options (TROs) for hedging and evaluating short-term tail risks. Under the Fréchet distribution assumption for maximum losses, the closed-form TRO pricing formulas are obtained. Simulation examples demonstrate the accuracy of the pricing formulas. Furthermore, they show that, no matter whether at scale level (symmetric “normal” risk, with greater volatility) or shape level (asymmetric tail risk, with a smaller value in tail index), the greater the risk, the more expensive the TRO calls, and the cheaper the TRO puts. Using calibration, one can obtain the TRO-implied volatility and the TRO-implied tail index. The former is analogous to the Black-Scholes implied volatility, which can measure the overall symmetric market volatility. The latter measures the asymmetry in underlying losses, mirrors market sentiment, and provides financial crisis warnings. Regarding the newly proposed TRO and its implied tail index, economic implications can be offered to investors, portfolio managers, and policy-makers.

Analyzing the efficiency of portfolio strategies based on the dividend yield concept: Evidence from the Russian stock market

Subject. The article focuses on the formation and management of the securities portfolio. In developed economies, various strategies are used to manage portfolios. The tendencies permeate the practice of portfolio managers and in the domestic market. Objectives. We analyze the efficiency of portfolio management strategies based on the dividend yield concept in order to find the most appropriate one for the Russian market for mid-term investment. Methods. The study is based on general methods of logic, comparative and statistical analysis, graphical and indicative comparative analysis. Results. Having tested strategies based on the dividend yield concept, we suggested using an improved mid-term strategy, which may suit many investors, including institutional ones. The article presents our suggestions on the improvement of a strategy for creating and managing a securities portfolio in the Russian stock market, which is based on the Dogs-of-the-Do principle. Conclusions and Relevance. Drawing upon the dividend yield concept, the proposed strategy ensures the average yield exceeding those of DOW 5 and DOW 10 strategies, bank deposit and investment in federal loan bonds. However, it is inferior to IMOEX and MOEXBS due to the lose of the portfolio balance once a year. Securities within the strategy make up ETF to lure more investors. The inclusion of FXUS increased the average annual yield by 2.45 percent. The addition of FXMM significantly reduces foreign currency risks. To optimize the strategy, there should be REPO with the central counterpart and CCP-cleared REPO, which raises its yield through arbitrage transactions.

European travel and leisure sector and uncertainties: A risk spillover analysis

The study analyzes the impact of uncertainty changes on the European travel and leisure sector stocks. We use economic policy uncertainty, geopolitical uncertainty, financial market uncertainty, and crude oil price uncertainty as uncertainty variables. We also analyze the extreme risk transmission from the uncertainty variables to the European travel and leisure sector stocks using the copula-based conditional Value-at-Risk (CoVaR) approach. The findings provide evidence of a significant impact of uncertainty variables on travel and leisure stocks mainly on the lower quantiles. The findings also indicate the significant downside and upside risk spillover effect from the extreme upside and downside movements in the uncertainty variables, respectively. The findings have implications for individual investors, portfolio managers, and institutional investors.

Do Cryptocurrencies Offer Diversification Benefits for Equity Portfolios?

Cryptocurrencies are becoming an exciting topic for legislative bodies, practitioners, media, and scholars with diverse academic backgrounds. The work identifies diversification benefits when cryptocurrencies are combined with the equity instruments from Visegrad Stock Exchanges. Furthermore, the results of the study explore financial and economic benefits for the investors of combining cryptocurrencies with equity stocks on the mixed portfolio. Three different independent experiments were conducted to observe diversification benefits generated from cryptocurrencies. Results from the two experiments show that cryptocurrencies employ higher portfolio risk and generate higher returns when they are involved with equity stocks portfolios. The first experiment indicates that cryptocurrencies reduce the risk level of the equity portfolios while increase average returns. Providing the equity portfolios with additional equity stocks lower the portfolio risk which is in line with the theoretical paradigms. Results indicate that cryptocurrencies must be seriously considered by the portfolio managers as an essential aspect of the portfolio diversification benefits. Future studies might raise the samples of selected portfolios with stocks from different stock indexes, to identify the problem from a broader perspective.

Examining Asset Pricing Anomalies: Evidence from Europe

We examine five important asset pricing anomalies, namely, size, value, momentum, profitability, and investment rate to evaluate their efficacy in major West European economies, that is, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. We employ four prominent asset pricing models, namely Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM), Fama–French three-factor (FF3) model, Carhart model and Fama–French five-factor (FF5) model to evaluate whether portfolio managers can create trading strategies to generate risk-adjusted extra normal returns for their investors. We also examine the prominent anomalies which pass the test of asset pricing in our sample countries and evaluate the best performing asset pricing model in explaining returns in each of these countries. We find that in spite of being matured markets, these countries provide portfolio managers with opportunities to exploit these strategies to generate extra normal returns for their investors. Momentum anomaly for Germany and profitability anomaly for Italy can be exploited by fund managers for generating risk-adjusted returns. For France, except for net investment rate anomaly, all the other anomalies remained unexplained by asset pricing models. We also find CAPM to be the better model in explaining returns of Italy and Spain. While FF3 factor and FF5 factor models explain returns in Germany, our sample asset pricing models failed to work for France. Our study has implications for portfolio managers, academia, and policymakers.