IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ris/eaerev/0041.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Country Fundamentals and Currency Excess Returns

Author

Listed:
  • Kim, Daehwan

    (Konkuk University)

  • Song, Chi-Young

    (Kookmin University)

Abstract

We examine whether country fundamentals help explain the cross-section of currency excess returns. For this purpose, we consider fundamental variables such as default risk, foreign exchange rate regime, capital control as well as interest rate in the multi-factor model framework. Our empirical results show that fundamental factors explain a large part of the cross-section of currency excess returns. The zero-intercept restriction of the factor model is not rejected for most currencies. They also reveal that our factor model with country fundamentals performs better than a factor model with usual investment-style factors. Our main empirical results are based on 2001-2010 balanced panel data of 19 major currencies. This paper may fill the gap between country fundamentals and practitioners' strategies on currency investment.

Suggested Citation

  • Kim, Daehwan & Song, Chi-Young, 2014. "Country Fundamentals and Currency Excess Returns," East Asian Economic Review, Korea Institute for International Economic Policy, vol. 18(2), pages 111-142, June.
  • Handle: RePEc:ris:eaerev:0041
    DOI: 10.11644/KIEP.JEAI.2014.18.2.277
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.11644/KIEP.JEAI.2014.18.2.277
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.11644/KIEP.JEAI.2014.18.2.277?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Melvin, Michael & Taylor, Mark P., 2009. "The crisis in the foreign exchange market," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(8), pages 1317-1330, December.
    2. Hansen, Lars Peter, 1982. "Large Sample Properties of Generalized Method of Moments Estimators," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(4), pages 1029-1054, July.
    3. Frankel, Jeffrey & Poonawala, Jumana, 2010. "The forward market in emerging currencies: Less biased than in major currencies," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 585-598, April.
    4. Hanno Lustig & Adrien Verdelhan, 2011. "The Cross-Section of Foreign Currency Risk Premia and Consumption Growth Risk: Reply," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(7), pages 3477-3500, December.
    5. Hansen, Lars Peter & Hodrick, Robert J, 1980. "Forward Exchange Rates as Optimal Predictors of Future Spot Rates: An Econometric Analysis," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 88(5), pages 829-853, October.
    6. Raymond Kan & Guofu Zhou, 1999. "A Critique of the Stochastic Discount Factor Methodology," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 54(4), pages 1221-1248, August.
    7. Gropp, Reint & Vesala, Jukka & Vulpes, Giuseppe, 2006. "Equity and Bond Market Signals as Leading Indicators of Bank Fragility," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 38(2), pages 399-428, March.
    8. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2004. "The Modern History of Exchange Rate Arrangements: A Reinterpretation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 119(1), pages 1-48.
    9. Craig Burnside & Martin Eichenbaum & Isaac Kleshchelski & Sergio Rebelo, 2011. "Do Peso Problems Explain the Returns to the Carry Trade?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(3), pages 853-891.
    10. Hanno Lustig & Adrien Verdelhan, 2007. "The Cross Section of Foreign Currency Risk Premia and Consumption Growth Risk," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(1), pages 89-117, March.
    11. Coudert, Virginie & Mignon, Valérie, 2013. "The “forward premium puzzle” and the sovereign default risk," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 491-511.
    12. Hiro Ito & Menzie Chinn, 2007. "Price‐Based Measurement Of Financial Globalization: A Cross‐Country Study Of Interest Rate Parity," Pacific Economic Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(4), pages 419-444, October.
    13. Ethan Ilzetzki & Carmen M Reinhart & Kenneth S Rogoff, 2019. "Exchange Arrangements Entering the Twenty-First Century: Which Anchor will Hold?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 134(2), pages 599-646.
    14. Jordà, Òscar & Taylor, Alan M., 2012. "The carry trade and fundamentals: Nothing to fear but FEER itself," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(1), pages 74-90.
    15. Hanno Lustig & Nikolai Roussanov & Adrien Verdelhan, 2011. "Common Risk Factors in Currency Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(11), pages 3731-3777.
    16. Yang, Fan, 2013. "Investment shocks and the commodity basis spread," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(1), pages 164-184.
    17. Bansal, Ravi & Dahlquist, Magnus, 2000. "The forward premium puzzle: different tales from developed and emerging economies," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(1), pages 115-144, June.
    18. Pojarliev, Momtchil & Levich, Richard M., 2010. "Trades of the living dead: Style differences, style persistence and performance of currency fund managers," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(8), pages 1752-1775, December.
    19. Martin Eichenbaum & Craig Burnside & Sergio Rebelo, 2007. "The Returns to Currency Speculation in Emerging Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(2), pages 333-338, May.
    20. Stephen Gilmore & Fumio Hayashi, 2011. "Emerging Market Currency Excess Returns," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 3(4), pages 85-111, October.
    21. Fong, Wai-Ming & Valente, Giorgio & Fung, Joseph K.W., 2010. "Covered interest arbitrage profits: The role of liquidity and credit risk," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(5), pages 1098-1107, May.
    22. Arnaud Jobert & Ms. Janet Kong & Mr. Jorge A Chan-Lau, 2004. "An Option-Based Approach to Bank Vulnerabilities in Emerging Markets," IMF Working Papers 2004/033, International Monetary Fund.
    23. Markus K. Brunnermeier & Stefan Nagel & Lasse H. Pedersen, 2009. "Carry Trades and Currency Crashes," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2008, Volume 23, pages 313-347, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    24. Robert P. Flood & Andrew K. Rose, 2002. "Uncovered Interest Parity in Crisis," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 49(2), pages 1-6.
    25. Daniel, Kent & Titman, Sheridan, 1997. "Evidence on the Characteristics of Cross Sectional Variation in Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 1-33, March.
    26. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    27. Black, Fischer & Scholes, Myron S, 1973. "The Pricing of Options and Corporate Liabilities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(3), pages 637-654, May-June.
    28. Cochrane, John H, 1996. "A Cross-Sectional Test of an Investment-Based Asset Pricing Model," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 104(3), pages 572-621, June.
    29. Fama, Eugene F & MacBeth, James D, 1973. "Risk, Return, and Equilibrium: Empirical Tests," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(3), pages 607-636, May-June.
    30. Marta Szymanowska & Frans Roon & Theo Nijman & Rob Goorbergh, 2014. "An Anatomy of Commodity Futures Risk Premia," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 69(1), pages 453-482, February.
    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. Mantzura, Ariel & Schreiber, Ben Z., 2019. "Predicting foreign investors’ carry trade activity in the Israeli FX market using a time-varying currency risk premium approach," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 438-457.

    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. Atanasov, Victoria & Nitschka, Thomas, 2014. "Currency excess returns and global downside market risk," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 268-285.
    2. Byrne, Joseph P. & Ibrahim, Boulis Maher & Sakemoto, Ryuta, 2019. "Carry trades and commodity risk factors," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 121-129.
    3. Engel, Charles, 2014. "Exchange Rates and Interest Parity," Handbook of International Economics, in: Gopinath, G. & Helpman, . & Rogoff, K. (ed.), Handbook of International Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 453-522, Elsevier.
    4. Byrne, Joseph P. & Ibrahim, Boulis Maher & Sakemoto, Ryuta, 2022. "The time-varying risk price of currency portfolios," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    5. Vitaly Orlov, 2018. "Solvency Risk Premia and the Carry Trades," Working Papers on Finance 1802, University of St. Gallen, School of Finance.
    6. Jiang, Xue & Han, Liyan & Yin, Libo, 2019. "Can skewness predict currency excess returns?," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 628-641.
    7. Pasquale Della Corte & Steven J. Riddiough & Lucio Sarno, 2016. "Currency Premia and Global Imbalances," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(8), pages 2161-2193.
    8. Jamali, Ibrahim & Yamani, Ehab & Smallwood, Aaron D., 2023. "An investment-based explanation of currency excess returns," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    9. Ledenyov, Dimitri O. & Ledenyov, Viktor O., 2015. "Wave function method to forecast foreign currencies exchange rates at ultra high frequency electronic trading in foreign currencies exchange markets," MPRA Paper 67470, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Gurdip Bakshi & Xiaohui Gao & Alberto G. Rossi, 2019. "Understanding the Sources of Risk Underlying the Cross Section of Commodity Returns," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(2), pages 619-641, February.
    11. Wenliang Guo, 2020. "Currency Regimes, Volatility Risks, and Carry Trades: The Option Value of Government Currency Intervention in Emerging Markets," Journal of Applied Finance & Banking, SCIENPRESS Ltd, vol. 10(3), pages 1-4.
    12. Lettau, Martin & Maggiori, Matteo & Weber, Michael, 2014. "Conditional risk premia in currency markets and other asset classes," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(2), pages 197-225.
    13. Dupuy, Philippe & James, Jessica & Marsh, Ian W., 2021. "Attractive and non-attractive currencies," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    14. Yamani, Ehab, 2021. "Foreign exchange market efficiency and the global financial crisis: Fundamental versus technical information," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 74-89.
    15. Pasquale Della Corte & Steven J. Riddiough & Lucio Sarno, 2016. "Currency Premia and Global Imbalances," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(8), pages 2161-2193.
    16. Jamali, Ibrahim & Yamani, Ehab, 2019. "Out-of-sample exchange rate predictability in emerging markets: Fundamentals versus technical analysis," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 241-263.
    17. Thomas Nitschka, 2009. "Momentum in stock market returns, risk premia on foreign currencies and international financial integration," IEW - Working Papers 405, Institute for Empirical Research in Economics - University of Zurich.
    18. Frankel, Jeffrey & Poonawala, Jumana, 2010. "The forward market in emerging currencies: Less biased than in major currencies," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 585-598, April.
    19. Mulder, Arjen & Tims, Ben, 2018. "Conditioning carry trades: Less risk, more return," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 1-19.
    20. Choi, Jin Ho & Suh, Sangwon, 2021. "A filtered currency carry trade," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Currency Excess Returns; Country Fundamentals; Factor Model; Fundamental Factors; Investment-style Factors;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F31 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - Foreign Exchange
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G15 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - International Financial Markets

    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:ris:eaerev:0041. 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: JE Lee (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/kieppkr.html .

    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.