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Flight-to-liquidity, market uncertainty, and the actions of mutual fund investors

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  • Ben-Rephael, Azi

Abstract

We explore the trading decisions of equity mutual funds during ten periods of extreme market uncertainty. We find that mutual funds reduced their aggregate holdings of illiquid stocks. Exploring the drivers behind this result reveals that this is mainly driven by larger withdrawals from funds that hold less liquid stocks. We further find that the sell-off of illiquid stocks occurred only after initial deterioration in market conditions, consistent with retail investors’ response to bad performance. At a broader level, this shows that mutual funds consumed liquidity during periods where liquidity was most valuable. Moreover, the fact that fund managers traded in response to these withdrawals suggests a potentially magnifying channel for the drop in illiquid stock prices, also known as flight-to-liquidity.

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  • Ben-Rephael, Azi, 2017. "Flight-to-liquidity, market uncertainty, and the actions of mutual fund investors," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 30-44.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jfinin:v:31:y:2017:i:c:p:30-44
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jfi.2017.05.002
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    Cited by:

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    2. Rohan Arora & Chen Fan & Guillaume Ouellet Leblanc, 2019. "Liquidity Management of Canadian Corporate Bond Mutual Funds: A Machine Learning Approach," Staff Analytical Notes 2019-7, Bank of Canada.
    3. Kinateder, Harald & Campbell, Ross & Choudhury, Tonmoy, 2021. "Safe haven in GFC versus COVID-19: 100 turbulent days in the financial markets," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 43(C).
    4. Kim, Donghyun & Li, Chengcheng & Wang, Xiaoqiong, 2023. "Liquidity Dry-ups in equity markets," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 86(C).
    5. Farzami, Yasmine & Gregory-Allen, Russell & Molchanov, Alexander & Sehrish, Saba, 2021. "COVID-19 and the liquidity network," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 42(C).
    6. Itay Goldstein & Jonathan Witmer & Jing Yang, 2018. "Following the Money: Evidence for the Portfolio Balance Channel of Quantitative Easing," Staff Working Papers 18-33, Bank of Canada.
    7. Hassan, M. Kabir & Djajadikerta, Hadrian Geri & Choudhury, Tonmoy & Kamran, Muhammad, 2022. "Safe havens in Islamic financial markets: COVID-19 versus GFC," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    8. Kamal, Javed Bin & Wohar, Mark, 2023. "Heterogenous responses of stock markets to covid related news and sentiments: Evidence from the 1st year of pandemic," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 173(C), pages 68-85.
    9. Ulf Lewrick & Jochen Schanz, 2023. "Towards a Macroprudential Framework for Investment Funds: Swing Pricing and Investor Redemptions," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 19(3), pages 229-267, August.
    10. Zaremba, Adam & Kizys, Renatas & Aharon, David Y. & Umar, Zaghum, 2022. "Term spreads and the COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from international sovereign bond markets," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 44(C).
    11. Zhang, Jinhua & Mao, Rui & Wang, Jieyu & Xing, Mengying, 2021. "The way back home: Trading behaviours of foreign institutional investors in China amid the COVID-19 pandemic," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    12. Elizabeth Nedumparambil & Anup Kumar Bhandari, 2022. "Risk factors, uncertainty, and investment decision: evidence from mutual fund flows from India," Indian Economic Review, Springer, vol. 57(2), pages 349-372, December.
    13. Hu, Gang & Jo, Koren M. & Wang, Yi Alex & Xie, Jing, 2018. "Institutional trading and Abel Noser data," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 143-167.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Market uncertainty; Financial crises; Liquidity; Flight-to-liquidity; Flow-induced trading; Mutual funds; Institutional investors; Liquidity provision; Portfolio liquidation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G01 - Financial Economics - - General - - - Financial Crises
    • 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
    • G20 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - General

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