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The Dog That Did Not Bark: A Defense of Return Predictability

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Author Info
John H. Cochrane

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Abstract

If returns are not predictable, dividend growth must be predictable, to generate the observed variation in divided yields. I find that the absence of dividend growth predictability gives stronger evidence than does the presence of return predictability. Long-horizon return forecasts give the same strong evidence. These tests exploit the negative correlation of return forecasts with dividend-yield autocorrelation across samples, together with sensible upper bounds on dividend-yield autocorrelation, to deliver more powerful statistics. I reconcile my findings with the literature that finds poor power in long-horizon return forecasts, and with the literature that notes the poor out-of-sample R-super-2 of return-forecasting regressions. The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Society for Financial Studies. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org, Oxford University Press.

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File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/rfs/hhm046
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Publisher Info
Article provided by Oxford University Press for Society for Financial Studies in its journal The Review of Financial Studies.

Volume (Year): 21 (2008)
Issue (Month): 4 (July)
Pages: 1533-1575
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Handle: RePEc:oup:rfinst:v:21:y:2008:i:4:p:1533-1575

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Goetzmann, William Nelson & Jorion, Philippe, 1993. " Testing the Predictive Power of Dividend Yields," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(2), pages 663-79, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  2. Amit Goval & Ivo Welch, 2004. "A Comprehensive Look at the Empirical Performance of Equity Premium Prediction," NBER Working Papers 10483, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. Martin Lettau & Sydney Ludvigson, 2003. "Expected Returns and Expected Dividend Growth," NBER Working Papers 9605, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Kothari, S. P. & Shanken, Jay, 1997. "Book-to-market, dividend yield, and expected market returns: A time-series analysis," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 169-203, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Nicholas Barberis, 2000. "Investing for the Long Run when Returns Are Predictable," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(1), pages 225-264, 02. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Walter Torous & Rossen Valkanov & Shu Yan, 2004. "On Predicting Stock Returns with Nearly Integrated Explanatory Variables," Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 77(4), pages 937-966, October. [Downloadable!]
  7. John Y. Campbell & Samuel B. Thompson, 2005. "Predicting the Equity Premium Out of Sample: Can Anything Beat the Historical Average?," Harvard Institute of Economic Research Working Papers 2084, Harvard - Institute of Economic Research. [Downloadable!]
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  8. Andrew Ang & Geert Bekaert, 2001. "Stock Return Predictability: Is it There?," NBER Working Papers 8207, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Gregory Mankiw, N. & Shapiro, Matthew D., 1986. "Do we reject too often? : Small sample properties of tests of rational expectations models," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 139-145. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Craine, Roger, 1993. "Rational bubbles : A test," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 17(5-6), pages 829-846. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  11. Amit Goyal & Ivo Welch, 2002. "Predicting the Equity Premium With Dividend Ratios," NBER Working Papers 8788, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  12. Valkanov, Rossen, 2003. "Long-horizon regressions: theoretical results and applications," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(2), pages 201-232, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1988. "Dividend yields and expected stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 3-25, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. Campbell, John Y., 2001. "Why long horizons? A study of power against persistent alternatives," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 8(5), pages 459-491, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  15. Hodrick, Robert J, 1992. "Dividend Yields and Expected Stock Returns: Alternative Procedures for Inference and Measurement," Review of Financial Studies, Oxford University Press for Society for Financial Studies, vol. 5(3), pages 357-86. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  16. LeRoy, Stephen F & Porter, Richard D, 1981. "The Present-Value Relation: Tests Based on Implied Variance Bounds," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(3), pages 555-74, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  17. Jacob Boudoukh & Roni Michaely & Matthew Richardson & Michael Roberts, 2004. "On the Importance of Measuring Payout Yield: Implications for Empirical Asset Pricing," NBER Working Papers 10651, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  18. Lewellen, Jonathan, 2004. "Predicting returns with financial ratios," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(2), pages 209-235, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  19. Robert F. Stambaugh, 1999. "Predictive Regressions," NBER Technical Working Papers 0240, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  20. Keim, Donald B. & Stambaugh, Robert F., 1986. "Predicting returns in the stock and bond markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 17(2), pages 357-390, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  21. Shiller, Robert J, 1981. "Do Stock Prices Move Too Much to be Justified by Subsequent Changes in Dividends?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(3), pages 421-36, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  22. John Y. Campbell, Robert J. Shiller, 1988. "The Dividend-Price Ratio and Expectations of Future Dividends and Discount Factors," Review of Financial Studies, Oxford University Press for Society for Financial Studies, vol. 1(3), pages 195-228. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  23. Robert J. Shiller, 1984. "Stock Prices and Social Dynamics," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 719R, Cowles Foundation, Yale University. [Downloadable!]
  24. Cochrane, John H, 1988. "How Big Is the Random Walk in GNP?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 96(5), pages 893-920, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  25. Nelson, Charles R & Kim, Myung J, 1993. " Predictable Stock Returns: The Role of Small Sample Bias," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(2), pages 641-61, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  26. Cochrane, John H, 1992. "Explaining the Variance of Price-Dividend Ratios," Review of Financial Studies, Oxford University Press for Society for Financial Studies, vol. 5(2), pages 243-80. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  27. Pontiff, Jeffrey & Schall, Lawrence D., 1998. "Book-to-market ratios as predictors of market returns1," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(2), pages 141-160, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  28. Cochrane, John H., 1991. "Volatility tests and efficient markets : A review essay," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 463-485, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  29. Campbell, John Y. & Yogo, Motohiro, 2006. "Efficient tests of stock return predictability," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 27-60, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Full references

Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Tom Engsted, 2009. "Statistical vs. Economic Significance in Economics and Econometrics: Further comments on McCloskey & Ziliak," CREATES Research Papers 2009-17, School of Economics and Management, University of Aarhus. [Downloadable!]
  2. Martin Lettau & Jessica A. Wachter, 2009. "The Term Structures of Equity and Interest Rates," NBER Working Papers 14698, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Tim Bollerslev & Hao Zhou, 2007. "Expected Stock Returns and Variance Risk Premia," CREATES Research Papers 2007-17, School of Economics and Management, University of Aarhus. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  4. Schrimpf, Andreas, 2008. "International Stock Return Predictability Under Model Uncertainty," ZEW Discussion Papers 08-048, ZEW - Zentrum für Europäische Wirtschaftsforschung / Center for European Economic Research. [Downloadable!]
  5. Miguel A. Ferreira & Pedro Santa-Clara, 2008. "Forecasting Stock Market Returns: The Sum of the Parts is More than the Whole," NBER Working Papers 14571, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Jonathan Fletcher & Patricia Ntozi-Obwale, 2009. "Exploring the Conditional Performance of U.K. Unit Trusts," Journal of Financial Services Research, Springer, vol. 36(1), pages 21-44, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Lubos Pastor & Robert F. Stambaugh, 2007. "Predictive Systems: Living with Imperfect Predictors," NBER Working Papers 12814, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  8. Whelan, Karl, 2006. "Consumption and Expected Asset Returns without Assumptions About Unobservables," MPRA Paper 5891, University Library of Munich, Germany. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  9. Tom Engsted & Thomas Q. Pedersen, 2009. "The dividend-price ratio does predict dividend growth: International evidence," CREATES Research Papers 2009-36, School of Economics and Management, University of Aarhus. [Downloadable!]
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