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How does economic policy uncertainty affect the bitcoin market?

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  • Wang, Pengfei
  • Li, Xiao
  • Shen, Dehua
  • Zhang, Wei

Abstract

This paper examines how economic policy uncertainty (EPU) impacts the Bitcoin (BTC) markets denominated in local currencies. We take BTC against British Pound (GBP) and the United States dollar (USD) as examples and construct the value-weighted BTC/GBP and BTC/USD composite indices. Our results show that the returns around the highest EPU days are significantly greater than those around the lowest EPU days. Further, the United States (US) EPU increases the volatility and trading volume of BTC after EPU spike days, whereas the United Kingdom (UK) EPU does not show such trends. Moreover, we observe a spillover effect for the US EPU to the UK BTC market. We further construct the dynamic conditional correlation (DCC)-GARCH model to test the dynamic correlation between EPU and BTC. Our results show that the effect of the US EPU on BTC/USD is greater than the effect of the UK EPU on BTC/GBP. Our empirical findings may provide insights for regulators to intervene in speculations in cryptocurrency markets effectively.

Suggested Citation

  • Wang, Pengfei & Li, Xiao & Shen, Dehua & Zhang, Wei, 2020. "How does economic policy uncertainty affect the bitcoin market?," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:riibaf:v:53:y:2020:i:c:s0275531919308037
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ribaf.2020.101234
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