IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/chsofr/v88y2016icp48-58.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Stylized facts of price gaps in limit order books

Author

Listed:
  • Gu, Gao-Feng
  • Xiong, Xiong
  • Zhang, Yong-Jie
  • Chen, Wei
  • Zhang, Wei
  • Zhou, Wei-Xing

Abstract

Price gap, defined as the logarithmic price difference between the first two occupied price levels on the same side of a limit order book (LOB), is a key determinant of market depth, which is one of the dimensions of liquidity. However, the properties of price gaps have not been thoroughly studied due to the less availability of ultrahigh frequency data. In the paper, we rebuild the LOB dynamics based on the order flow data of 26 A-share stocks traded on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange in 2003. Three key empirical statistical properties of price gaps are investigated. We find that the distribution of price gaps has a power-law tail for all stocks with an average tail exponent close to 3.2. Applying modern statistical methods, we confirm that the gap time series are long-range correlated and possess multifractal nature. These three features appear to be different in the measures across stocks, but they are similar for the buy and sell LOBs within each stock. Furthermore, we also unveil buy–sell asymmetry phenomena in the properties of price gaps on the buy and sell sides of the LOBs for individual stocks. These findings deepen our understanding of the dynamics of liquidity of common stocks and can be used to calibrate agent-based computational financial models.

Suggested Citation

  • Gu, Gao-Feng & Xiong, Xiong & Zhang, Yong-Jie & Chen, Wei & Zhang, Wei & Zhou, Wei-Xing, 2016. "Stylized facts of price gaps in limit order books," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 48-58.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:chsofr:v:88:y:2016:i:c:p:48-58
    DOI: 10.1016/j.chaos.2015.10.031
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960077915003410
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.chaos.2015.10.031?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gu, Gao-Feng & Chen, Wei & Zhou, Wei-Xing, 2008. "Empirical shape function of limit-order books in the Chinese stock market," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 387(21), pages 5182-5188.
    2. Wood, Robert A & McInish, Thomas H & Ord, J Keith, 1985. "An Investigation of Transactions Data for NYSE Stocks," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 40(3), pages 723-739, July.
    3. Martin D. Gould & Mason A. Porter & Stacy Williams & Mark McDonald & Daniel J. Fenn & Sam D. Howison, 2013. "Limit order books," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(11), pages 1709-1742, November.
    4. Pan, Raj Kumar & Sinha, Sitabhra, 2008. "Inverse-cubic law of index fluctuation distribution in Indian markets," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 387(8), pages 2055-2065.
    5. Anirban Chakraborti & Ioane Muni Toke & Marco Patriarca & Frederic Abergel, 2011. "Econophysics review: I. Empirical facts," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(7), pages 991-1012.
    6. Barunik, Jozef & Kristoufek, Ladislav, 2010. "On Hurst exponent estimation under heavy-tailed distributions," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 389(18), pages 3844-3855.
    7. Glosten, Lawrence R. & Milgrom, Paul R., 1985. "Bid, ask and transaction prices in a specialist market with heterogeneously informed traders," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 71-100, March.
    8. Gabaix, Xavier & Gopikrishnan, Parameswaran & Plerou, Vasiliki & Stanley, H.Eugene, 2003. "Understanding the cubic and half-cubic laws of financial fluctuations," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 324(1), pages 1-5.
    9. Zhang, J.W. & Zhang, Y. & Kleinert, H., 2007. "Power tails of index distributions in chinese stock market," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 377(1), pages 166-172.
    10. Jiang, Zhi-Qiang & Xie, Wen-Jie & Zhou, Wei-Xing, 2014. "Testing the weak-form efficiency of the WTI crude oil futures market," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 405(C), pages 235-244.
    11. Zhou, Wei-Xing, 2012. "Finite-size effect and the components of multifractality in financial volatility," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 147-155.
    12. Wei-Xing Zhou, 2012. "Universal price impact functions of individual trades in an order-driven market," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(8), pages 1253-1263, June.
    13. J. Doyne Farmer, 2002. "Market force, ecology and evolution," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 11(5), pages 895-953, November.
    14. Coronel-Brizio, H.F. & Hernández-Montoya, A.R., 2005. "On fitting the Pareto–Levy distribution to stock market index data: Selecting a suitable cutoff value," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 354(C), pages 437-449.
    15. Parameswaran Gopikrishnan & Vasiliki Plerou & Luis A. Nunes Amaral & Martin Meyer & H. Eugene Stanley, 1999. "Scaling of the distribution of fluctuations of financial market indices," Papers cond-mat/9905305, arXiv.org.
    16. Xavier Gabaix & Parameswaran Gopikrishnan & Vasiliki Plerou & H. Eugene Stanley, 2006. "Institutional Investors and Stock Market Volatility," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 121(2), pages 461-504.
    17. Martin D. Gould & Mason A. Porter & Stacy Williams & Mark McDonald & Daniel J. Fenn & Sam D. Howison, 2010. "Limit Order Books," Papers 1012.0349, arXiv.org, revised Apr 2013.
    18. Naes, Randi & Skjeltorp, Johannes A., 2006. "Order book characteristics and the volume-volatility relation: Empirical evidence from a limit order market," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 408-432, November.
    19. Guo-Hua Mu & Wei-Xing Zhou, 2010. "Nonuniversal distributions of stock returns in an emerging market," Papers 1003.5984, arXiv.org.
    20. Yi-Cheng Zhang, 1999. "Toward a Theory of Marginally Efficient Markets," Papers cond-mat/9901243, arXiv.org.
    21. Amir Bashan & Ronny Bartsch & Jan W. Kantelhardt & Shlomo Havlin, 2008. "Comparison of detrending methods for fluctuation analysis," Papers 0804.4081, arXiv.org.
    22. Clark, Peter K, 1973. "A Subordinated Stochastic Process Model with Finite Variance for Speculative Prices," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 41(1), pages 135-155, January.
    23. Cohen, Kalman J & Maier, Steven F & Schwartz, Robert A & Whitcomb, David K, 1981. "Transaction Costs, Order Placement Strategy, and Existence of the Bid-Ask Spread," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(2), pages 287-305, April.
    24. Bertram, William K, 2004. "An empirical investigation of Australian Stock Exchange data," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 341(C), pages 533-546.
    25. Kantelhardt, Jan W. & Zschiegner, Stephan A. & Koscielny-Bunde, Eva & Havlin, Shlomo & Bunde, Armin & Stanley, H.Eugene, 2002. "Multifractal detrended fluctuation analysis of nonstationary time series," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 316(1), pages 87-114.
    26. Richardson, Gordon & Sefcik, Stephan E. & Thompson, Rex, 1986. "A test of dividend irrelevance using volume reactions to a change in dividend policy," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(2), pages 313-333, December.
    27. Gao-Feng Gu & Wei-Xing Zhou, 2008. "Emergence of long memory in stock volatility from a modified Mike-Farmer model," Papers 0807.4639, arXiv.org, revised May 2009.
    28. Jain, Prem C. & Joh, Gun-Ho, 1988. "The Dependence between Hourly Prices and Trading Volume," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 23(3), pages 269-283, September.
    29. Mike, Szabolcs & Farmer, J. Doyne, 2008. "An empirical behavioral model of liquidity and volatility," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 200-234, January.
    30. Epps, Thomas W., 1977. "Security Price Changes and Transaction Volumes: Some Additional Evidence," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 12(1), pages 141-146, March.
    31. V. Plerou & P. Gopikrishnan & L. A. N. Amaral & M. Meyer & H. E. Stanley, 1999. "Scaling of the distribution of price fluctuations of individual companies," Papers cond-mat/9907161, arXiv.org.
    32. J. Doyne Farmer & Laszlo Gillemot & Fabrizio Lillo & Szabolcs Mike & Anindya Sen, 2004. "What really causes large price changes?," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 4(4), pages 383-397.
    33. Gu, Gao-Feng & Chen, Wei & Zhou, Wei-Xing, 2008. "Empirical regularities of order placement in the Chinese stock market," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 387(13), pages 3173-3182.
    34. Marcus Lim & Richard Coggins, 2005. "The immediate price impact of trades on the Australian Stock Exchange," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(4), pages 365-377.
    35. F. Lillo & Szabolcs Mike & J. Doyne Farmer, 2004. "A theory for long-memory in supply and demand," Papers cond-mat/0412708, arXiv.org, revised Mar 2005.
    36. Philipp Weber & Bernd Rosenow, 2006. "Large stock price changes: volume or liquidity?," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 6(1), pages 7-14.
    37. Karpoff, Jonathan M., 1987. "The Relation between Price Changes and Trading Volume: A Survey," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 22(1), pages 109-126, March.
    38. Tabak, B.M. & Takami, M.Y. & Cajueiro, D.O. & Petitinga, A., 2009. "Quantifying price fluctuations in the Brazilian stock market," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 388(1), pages 59-62.
    39. Gu, Gao-Feng & Chen, Wei & Zhou, Wei-Xing, 2008. "Empirical distributions of Chinese stock returns at different microscopic timescales," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 387(2), pages 495-502.
    40. Matteo, T. Di & Aste, T. & Dacorogna, Michel M., 2005. "Long-term memories of developed and emerging markets: Using the scaling analysis to characterize their stage of development," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 827-851, April.
    41. Zhang, Yi-Cheng, 1999. "Toward a theory of marginally efficient markets," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 269(1), pages 30-44.
    42. Wei-Xing Zhou, 2012. "Determinants of immediate price impacts at the trade level in an emerging order-driven market," Papers 1201.5448, arXiv.org.
    43. Vasiliki Plerou & Parameswaran Gopikrishnan & Xavier Gabaix & H. Eugene Stanley, 2004. "On the Origin of Power-Law Fluctuations in Stock Prices," Papers cond-mat/0403067, arXiv.org.
    44. Rogalski, Richard J, 1978. "The Dependence of Prices and Volume," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 60(2), pages 268-274, May.
    45. Bashan, Amir & Bartsch, Ronny & Kantelhardt, Jan W. & Havlin, Shlomo, 2008. "Comparison of detrending methods for fluctuation analysis," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 387(21), pages 5080-5090.
    46. Xavier Gabaix & Parameswaran Gopikrishnan & Vasiliki Plerou & H. Eugene Stanley, 2007. "A Theory of Limited Liquidity and Large Investors Causing Spikes in Stock Market Volatility and Trading Volume," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 5(2-3), pages 564-573, 04-05.
    47. J. Doyne Farmer & Fabrizio Lillo, 2003. "On the origin of power law tails in price fluctuations," Papers cond-mat/0309416, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2004.
    48. Boris Podobnik & Duan Wang & H. Eugene Stanley, 2012. "High-frequency trading model for a complex trading hierarchy," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(4), pages 559-566, October.
    49. Fabrizio Lillo & J. Doyne Farmer & Rosario N. Mantegna, 2003. "Master curve for price-impact function," Nature, Nature, vol. 421(6919), pages 129-130, January.
    50. Anirban Chakraborti & Ioane Muni Toke & Marco Patriarca & Frédéric Abergel, 2011. "Econophysics review: I. Empirical facts," Post-Print hal-00621058, HAL.
    51. Arianos, Sergio & Carbone, Anna, 2007. "Detrending moving average algorithm: A closed-form approximation of the scaling law," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 382(1), pages 9-15.
    52. Xavier Gabaix & Parameswaran Gopikrishnan & Vasiliki Plerou & H. Eugene Stanley, 2003. "A theory of power-law distributions in financial market fluctuations," Nature, Nature, vol. 423(6937), pages 267-270, May.
    53. Saatcioglu, Kemal & Starks, Laura T., 1998. "The stock price-volume relationship in emerging stock markets: the case of Latin America," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 14(2), pages 215-225, June.
    54. Benoit Mandelbrot, 2015. "The Variation of Certain Speculative Prices," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Anastasios G Malliaris & William T Ziemba (ed.), THE WORLD SCIENTIFIC HANDBOOK OF FUTURES MARKETS, chapter 3, pages 39-78, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    55. Robert Almgren, 2003. "Optimal execution with nonlinear impact functions and trading-enhanced risk," Applied Mathematical Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 10(1), pages 1-18.
    56. Harris, Lawrence, 1987. "Transaction Data Tests of the Mixture of Distributions Hypothesis," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 22(2), pages 127-141, June.
    57. Ying-Hui Shao & Gao Feng Gu & Zhi-Qiang Jiang & Wei-Xing Zhou & Didier Sornette, 2012. "Comparing the performance of FA, DFA and DMA using different synthetic long-range correlated time series," Papers 1208.4158, arXiv.org.
    58. Gallant, A Ronald & Rossi, Peter E & Tauchen, George, 1992. "Stock Prices and Volume," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 5(2), pages 199-242.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Duarte Queirós, Sílvio M. & Anteneodo, Celia, 2016. "Complexity in quantitative finance and economics," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 1-2.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gao-Feng Gu & Xiong Xiong & Yong-Jie Zhang & Wei Chen & Wei Zhang & Wei-Xing Zhou, 2014. "Stylized facts of price gaps in limit order books: Evidence from Chinese stocks," Papers 1405.1247, arXiv.org.
    2. Wei-Xing Zhou, 2012. "Universal price impact functions of individual trades in an order-driven market," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(8), pages 1253-1263, June.
    3. Ren, F. & Zheng, B. & Chen, P., 2010. "Modeling interactions of trading volumes in financial dynamics," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 389(14), pages 2744-2750.
    4. Derksen, M. & Kleijn, B. & de Vilder, R., 2022. "Heavy tailed distributions in closing auctions," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 593(C).
    5. Didier SORNETTE, 2014. "Physics and Financial Economics (1776-2014): Puzzles, Ising and Agent-Based Models," Swiss Finance Institute Research Paper Series 14-25, Swiss Finance Institute.
    6. Jean-Philippe Bouchaud & J. Doyne Farmer & Fabrizio Lillo, 2008. "How markets slowly digest changes in supply and demand," Papers 0809.0822, arXiv.org.
    7. Jian Zhou & Gao-Feng Gu & Zhi-Qiang Jiang & Xiong Xiong & Wei Chen & Wei Zhang & Wei-Xing Zhou, 2017. "Computational Experiments Successfully Predict the Emergence of Autocorrelations in Ultra-High-Frequency Stock Returns," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 50(4), pages 579-594, December.
    8. Gabaix, Xavier & Gopikrishnan, Parameswaran & Plerou, Vasiliki & Eugene Stanley, H., 2008. "Quantifying and understanding the economics of large financial movements," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 303-319, January.
    9. Wagner, D.C. & Schmitt, T.A. & Schäfer, R. & Guhr, T. & Wolf, D.E., 2014. "Analysis of a decision model in the context of equilibrium pricing and order book pricing," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 415(C), pages 347-353.
    10. M. Derksen & B. Kleijn & R. de Vilder, 2020. "Heavy tailed distributions in closing auctions," Papers 2012.10145, arXiv.org.
    11. Martin D. Gould & Mason A. Porter & Stacy Williams & Mark McDonald & Daniel J. Fenn & Sam D. Howison, 2010. "Limit Order Books," Papers 1012.0349, arXiv.org, revised Apr 2013.
    12. Ni, Xiao-Hui & Jiang, Zhi-Qiang & Gu, Gao-Feng & Ren, Fei & Chen, Wei & Zhou, Wei-Xing, 2010. "Scaling and memory in the non-Poisson process of limit order cancelation," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 389(14), pages 2751-2761.
    13. Xie, Wen-Jie & Li, Mu-Yao & Zhou, Wei-Xing, 2021. "Learning representation of stock traders and immediate price impacts," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    14. Jovanovic, Franck & Schinckus, Christophe, 2017. "Econophysics and Financial Economics: An Emerging Dialogue," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780190205034, Decembrie.
    15. Daniel C. Wagner & Thilo A. Schmitt & Rudi Schafer & Thomas Guhr & Dietrich E. Wolf, 2014. "Analysis of a decision model in the context of equilibrium pricing and order book pricing," Papers 1404.7356, arXiv.org.
    16. Jean-Philippe Bouchaud & Julien Kockelkoren & Marc Potters, 2006. "Random walks, liquidity molasses and critical response in financial markets," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 6(2), pages 115-123.
    17. Fei Ren & Li-Xin Zhong, 2011. "Price impact asymmetry of institutional trading in Chinese stock market," Papers 1110.3133, arXiv.org.
    18. Gao, Yan & Gao, Yao, 2015. "Statistical properties of short-selling and margin-trading activities and their impacts on returns in the Chinese stock markets," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 438(C), pages 293-307.
    19. Martin D. Gould & Mason A. Porter & Sam D. Howison, 2015. "Quasi-Centralized Limit Order Books," Papers 1502.00680, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2016.
    20. Gao-Feng Gu & Xiong Xiong & Hai-Chuan Xu & Wei Zhang & Yongjie Zhang & Wei Chen & Wei-Xing Zhou, 2021. "An empirical behavioral order-driven model with price limit rules," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 7(1), pages 1-24, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:chsofr:v:88:y:2016:i:c:p:48-58. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Thayer, Thomas R. (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/chaos-solitons-and-fractals .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.