IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jeborg/v161y2019icp158-179.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Attracting attention from peers: Excitement in social trading

Author

Listed:
  • Pelster, Matthias

Abstract

I study the impact of peers showing interest in investors’ trading on the latters’ future trading activities. To this end, I investigate the trading patterns of investors who attract attention of their peers on a social trading platform. My empirical findings suggest that social traders who draw attention of their peers show an increased trading activity and are more willing to take risks. This finding may be explained by investors becoming more excited about trading once they receive attention from their peers.

Suggested Citation

  • Pelster, Matthias, 2019. "Attracting attention from peers: Excitement in social trading," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 158-179.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:161:y:2019:i:c:p:158-179
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2019.03.010
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268119300812
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jebo.2019.03.010?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. Wohlgemuth, Veit & Berger, Elisabeth S.C. & Wenzel, Matthias, 2016. "More than just financial performance: Trusting investors in social trading," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(11), pages 4970-4974.
    2. Gervais, Simon & Odean, Terrance, 2001. "Learning to be Overconfident," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 14(1), pages 1-27.
    3. Robert J. Shiller, 1984. "Stock Prices and Social Dynamics," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 15(2), pages 457-510.
    4. Rawley Heimer, 2016. "Peer Pressure: Social Interaction and the Disposition Effect," Working Papers (Old Series) 1618, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    5. Eduardo B. Andrade & Terrance Odean & Shengle Lin, 2016. "Bubbling with Excitement: An Experiment," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 20(2), pages 447-466.
    6. Gemayel, Roland & Preda, Alex, 2018. "Does a scopic regime erode the disposition effect? Evidence from a social trading platform," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 154(C), pages 175-190.
    7. Rawley Z. Heimer, 2016. "Peer Pressure: Social Interaction and the Disposition Effect," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(11), pages 3177-3209.
    8. Christine Brown & Jonathan Dark & Kevin Davis, 2010. "Exchange traded contracts for difference: Design, pricing, and effects," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(12), pages 1108-1149, December.
    9. Heimer, Rawley Z., 2014. "Friends do let friends buy stocks actively," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 107(PB), pages 527-540.
    10. Daniel Dorn & Paul Sengmueller, 2009. "Trading as Entertainment?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 55(4), pages 591-603, April.
    11. Alok Kumar, 2009. "Who Gambles in the Stock Market?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(4), pages 1889-1933, August.
    12. Xiaohui Gao & Tse-Chun Lin, 2015. "Do Individual Investors Treat Trading as a Fun and Exciting Gambling Activity? Evidence from Repeated Natural Experiments," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(7), pages 2128-2166.
    13. Hvide, Hans K. & Östberg, Per, 2015. "Social interaction at work," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(3), pages 628-652.
    14. Choi, James J. & Laibson, David & Metrick, Andrew, 2002. "How does the Internet affect trading? Evidence from investor behavior in 401(k) plans," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(3), pages 397-421, June.
    15. Pelster, Matthias & Hofmann, Annette, 2018. "About the fear of reputational loss: Social trading and the disposition effect," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 75-88.
    16. Barber, Brad M. & Lee, Yi-Tsung & Liu, Yu-Jane & Odean, Terrance, 2014. "The cross-section of speculator skill: Evidence from day trading," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 18(C), pages 1-24.
    17. Mitchell A. Petersen, 2009. "Estimating Standard Errors in Finance Panel Data Sets: Comparing Approaches," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(1), pages 435-480, January.
    18. Han, Bing & Hirshleifer, David & Walden, Johan, 2022. "Social Transmission Bias and Investor Behavior," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 57(1), pages 390-412, February.
    19. Kuhnen, Camelia M. & Knutson, Brian, 2011. "The Influence of Affect on Beliefs, Preferences, and Financial Decisions," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 46(3), pages 605-626, June.
    20. Veronika K. Pool & Noah Stoffman & Scott E. Yonker, 2015. "The People in Your Neighborhood: Social Interactions and Mutual Fund Portfolios," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(6), pages 2679-2732, December.
    21. Brad M. Barber & Terrance Odean, 2001. "Boys will be Boys: Gender, Overconfidence, and Common Stock Investment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(1), pages 261-292.
    22. Brad M. Barber & Terrance Odean, 2002. "Online Investors: Do the Slow Die First?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 15(2), pages 455-488, March.
    23. Mark Grinblatt & Matti Keloharju, 2009. "Sensation Seeking, Overconfidence, and Trading Activity," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(2), pages 549-578, April.
    24. Jeffrey R. Brown & Zoran Ivković & Paul A. Smith & Scott Weisbenner, 2008. "Neighbors Matter: Causal Community Effects and Stock Market Participation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(3), pages 1509-1531, June.
    25. Richard Taffler, 2018. "Emotional finance: investment and the unconscious," The European Journal of Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(7-8), pages 630-653, May.
    26. Hailiang Chen & Prabuddha De & Yu (Jeffrey) Hu & Byoung-Hyoun Hwang, 2014. "Wisdom of Crowds: The Value of Stock Opinions Transmitted Through Social Media," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(5), pages 1367-1403.
    27. Anne Jones Dorn & Daniel Dorn & Paul Sengmueller, 2015. "Trading as Gambling," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 61(10), pages 2376-2393, October.
    28. Zhang, Annie C. & Fang, Jiali & Jacobsen, Ben & Marshall, Ben R., 2018. "Peer effects, personal characteristics and asset allocation," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 76-95.
    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. Scheckenbach, Isabel & Wimmer, Maximilian & Dorfleitner, Gregor, 2021. "The higher you fly, the harder you try not to fall: An analysis of the risk taking behavior in social trading," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 239-259.
    2. Breitmayer, Bastian & Massari, Filippo & Pelster, Matthias, 2019. "Swarm intelligence? Stock opinions of the crowd and stock returns," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 443-464.
    3. Schneider, Julian & Oehler, Andreas, 2021. "Competition for visibility: When do (FX) signal providers employ lotteries?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    4. Steiger, Sören & Pelster, Matthias, 2020. "Social interactions and asset pricing bubbles," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 503-522.
    5. Xuejun Jin & Jiawei Yu, 2022. "Does communication increase investors’ trading frequency? Evidence from a Chinese social trading platform," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 8(1), pages 1-32, December.
    6. Erdős, Sándor & Papp, Tamás & Vörös, Zsófia, 2022. "The effects of community-based signals on investment decisions in copy trading," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    7. Goodell, John W. & Kumar, Satish & Rao, Purnima & Verma, Shubhangi, 2023. "Emotions and stock market anomalies: A systematic review," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(C).
    8. Andreas Oehler & Julian Schneider, 2023. "Social trading: do signal providers trigger gambling?," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 17(4), pages 1269-1331, May.
    9. Riccardo Reith & Maximilian Fischer & Bettina Lis, 2020. "Explaining the intention to use social trading platforms: an empirical investigation," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 90(3), pages 427-460, April.
    10. Minh-Lý Liêu, 2021. "Peer attention and the disposition effect," Working Papers Dissertations 81, Paderborn University, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics.

    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. Andreas Oehler & Julian Schneider, 2023. "Social trading: do signal providers trigger gambling?," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 17(4), pages 1269-1331, May.
    2. Schneider, Julian & Oehler, Andreas, 2021. "Competition for visibility: When do (FX) signal providers employ lotteries?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    3. Xuejun Jin & Jiawei Yu, 2022. "Does communication increase investors’ trading frequency? Evidence from a Chinese social trading platform," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 8(1), pages 1-32, December.
    4. Liu, Hongqi & Peng, Cameron & Xiong, Wei A. & Xiong, Wei, 2022. "Taming the bias zoo," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(2), pages 716-741.
    5. Steiger, Sören & Pelster, Matthias, 2020. "Social interactions and asset pricing bubbles," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 503-522.
    6. Kormanyos, Emily & Hanspal, Tobin & Hackethal, Andreas, 2023. "Do gamblers invest in lottery stocks?," SAFE Working Paper Series 373, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE, revised 2023.
    7. Nicholas Apergis & Tasawar Hayat & Tareq Saeed, 2019. "The Role of Happiness in Financial Decisions: Evidence from Financial Portfolio Choice and Five European Countries," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 47(3), pages 343-360, September.
    8. Forman, John & Horton, Joanne, 2019. "Overconfidence, position size, and the link to performance," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 291-309.
    9. Liu, Hongqi & Peng, Cameron & Wei, Xiong & Wei, Xiong, 2022. "Taming the bias zoo," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 109301, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    10. Rawley Z. Heimer & Alp Simsek, 2017. "Should Retail Investors' Leverage Be Limited?," NBER Working Papers 24176, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Justin Cox & Adam Schwartz & Robert Ness, 2020. "Does what happen in Vegas stay in Vegas? Football gambling and stock market activity," Journal of Economics and Finance, Springer;Academy of Economics and Finance, vol. 44(4), pages 724-748, October.
    12. Cox, Ruben & Kamolsareeratana, Atcha & Kouwenberg, Roy, 2020. "Compulsive gambling in the financial markets: Evidence from two investor surveys," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    13. Hasso, Tim & Pelster, Matthias & Breitmayer, Bastian, 2019. "Who trades cryptocurrencies, how do they trade it, and how do they perform? Evidence from brokerage accounts," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 23(C), pages 64-74.
    14. Chen, Hailiang & Hwang, Byoung-Hyoun, 2022. "Listening in on investors’ thoughts and conversations," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(2), pages 426-444.
    15. Zhang, Annie C. & Fang, Jiali & Jacobsen, Ben & Marshall, Ben R., 2018. "Peer effects, personal characteristics and asset allocation," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 76-95.
    16. Abreu, Margarida & Mendes, Victor, 2012. "Information, overconfidence and trading: Do the sources of information matter?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 868-881.
    17. Heimer, Rawley & Simsek, Alp, 2019. "Should retail investors’ leverage be limited?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(3), pages 1-21.
    18. Da Ke, 2021. "Who Wears the Pants? Gender Identity Norms and Intrahousehold Financial Decision‐Making," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 76(3), pages 1389-1425, June.
    19. Liu, Hongqi & Peng, Cameron & Xiong, Wei A. & Xiong, Wei, 2020. "Resolving the excessive trading puzzle: an integrated approach based on surveys and transactions," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 118870, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    20. Manuel Ammann & Nic Schaub, 2021. "Do Individual Investors Trade on Investment-Related Internet Postings?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(9), pages 5679-5702, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Social interaction; Excitement; Emotions; Investor behavior; Trading activity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G15 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - International Financial Markets
    • H31 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Household

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:jeborg:v:161:y:2019:i:c:p:158-179. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jebo .

    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.