IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/emffin/v21y2022i1p32-63.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Can Equity be Safe-haven for Investment?

Author

Listed:
  • Janani Sri S.
  • Parthajit Kayal
  • G. Balasubramanian

Abstract

Popular investment choices such as fixed income, gold, and real estate have generated low returns over long horizons. Equity seems to have performed much better despite its inherent risk. Although, investors prefer safe-haven assets, they are increasingly moving to equities in search for better returns. We consider whether equity could be a safe-haven investment if chosen from quality stocks’ basket. We examine the safe-haven and hedging properties of the Nifty-50 constituent stocks over the period 2008–2020. To address this, we employ copula-based framework to model the dependence structure between stocks and five indices. We distinguish between safe-haven attributes and hedging features of the individual stocks. We show that the safe-haven properties of the Nifty-50 listed stocks are not as concentrated as gold but they show much low co-movement with the market. We call them pseudo–safe-haven as they are the safe-bets for investors seeking relatively safe-haven assets with impressive returns. JEL Codes: G11, G12, G15

Suggested Citation

  • Janani Sri S. & Parthajit Kayal & G. Balasubramanian, 2022. "Can Equity be Safe-haven for Investment?," Journal of Emerging Market Finance, Institute for Financial Management and Research, vol. 21(1), pages 32-63, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:emffin:v:21:y:2022:i:1:p:32-63
    DOI: 10.1177/09726527211068411
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/09726527211068411
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/09726527211068411?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. Dirk G. Baur & Brian M. Lucey, 2010. "Is Gold a Hedge or a Safe Haven? An Analysis of Stocks, Bonds and Gold," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 45(2), pages 217-229, May.
    2. Hoang, Thi Hong Van & Lahiani, Amine & Heller, David, 2016. "Is gold a hedge against inflation? New evidence from a nonlinear ARDL approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 54-66.
    3. Wu, Shan & Tong, Mu & Yang, Zhongyi & Derbali, Abdelkader, 2019. "Does gold or Bitcoin hedge economic policy uncertainty?," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 171-178.
    4. repec:oup:rfinst:v:25:y::i:12:p:3711-3751 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Reboredo, Juan C., 2013. "Is gold a safe haven or a hedge for the US dollar? Implications for risk management," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 2665-2676.
    6. Lai, YiHao & Tseng, Jen-Ching, 2010. "The role of Chinese stock market in global stock markets: A safe haven or a hedge?," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 19(2), pages 211-218, April.
    7. Fatum, Rasmus & Yamamoto, Yohei & Zhu, Guozhong, 2017. "Is the Renminbi a safe haven?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 189-202.
    8. Robert N McCauley & Patrick McGuire, 2009. "Dollar appreciation in 2008: safe haven, carry trades, dollar shortage and overhedging," BIS Quarterly Review, Bank for International Settlements, December.
    9. De Bock, Reinout & de Carvalho Filho, Irineu, 2015. "The behavior of currencies during risk-off episodes," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 218-234.
    10. Fatum, Rasmus & Yamamoto, Yohei, 2016. "Intra-safe haven currency behavior during the global financial crisis," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 49-64.
    11. Aloui, Riadh & Hammoudeh, Shawkat & Nguyen, Duc Khuong, 2013. "A time-varying copula approach to oil and stock market dependence: The case of transition economies," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 208-221.
    12. W. Breymann & A. Dias & P. Embrechts, 2003. "Dependence structures for multivariate high-frequency data in finance," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 3(1), pages 1-14.
    13. Parthajit Kayal & G. Balasubramanian, 2021. "Excess Volatility in Bitcoin: Extreme Value Volatility Estimation," IIM Kozhikode Society & Management Review, , vol. 10(2), pages 222-231, July.
    14. Lai, YiHao & Chen, Cathy W.S. & Gerlach, Richard, 2009. "Optimal dynamic hedging via copula-threshold-GARCH models," Mathematics and Computers in Simulation (MATCOM), Elsevier, vol. 79(8), pages 2609-2624.
    15. Matthew Hood & Farooq Malik, 2013. "Is gold the best hedge and a safe haven under changing stock market volatility?," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 22(2), pages 47-52, April.
    16. Wen, Xiaoqian & Cheng, Hua, 2018. "Which is the safe haven for emerging stock markets, gold or the US dollar?," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 69-90.
    17. Fratzscher, Marcel, 2009. "What explains global exchange rate movements during the financial crisis?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(8), pages 1390-1407, December.
    18. Ines Fortin & Christoph Kuzmics, 2002. "Tail‐dependence in stock‐return pairs," Intelligent Systems in Accounting, Finance and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 11(2), pages 89-107, April.
    19. Baur, Dirk G. & McDermott, Thomas K.J., 2016. "Why is gold a safe haven?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 10(C), pages 63-71.
    20. Yashraj Varma & Renuka Venkataramani & Parthajit Kayal & Moinak Maiti, 2021. "Short-Term Impact of COVID-19 on Indian Stock Market," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 14(11), pages 1-15, November.
    21. Grisse, Christian & Nitschka, Thomas, 2015. "On financial risk and the safe haven characteristics of Swiss franc exchange rates," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 153-164.
    22. Wenjun Feng & Yiming Wang & Zhengjun Zhang, 2018. "Can cryptocurrencies be a safe haven: a tail risk perspective analysis," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 50(44), pages 4745-4762, September.
    23. Zhu, Hui-Ming & Li, Rong & Li, Sufang, 2014. "Modelling dynamic dependence between crude oil prices and Asia-Pacific stock market returns," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 208-223.
    24. Didier Cossin & Henry Schellhorn, 2007. "Credit Risk in a Network Economy," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 53(10), pages 1604-1617, October.
    25. Parthajit Kayal & Purnima Rohilla, 2021. "Bitcoin in the economics and finance literature: a survey," SN Business & Economics, Springer, vol. 1(7), pages 1-21, July.
    26. Hood, Matthew & Malik, Farooq, 2013. "Is gold the best hedge and a safe haven under changing stock market volatility?," Review of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 47-52.
    27. Zakoian, Jean-Michel, 1994. "Threshold heteroskedastic models," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 18(5), pages 931-955, September.
    28. Glosten, Lawrence R & Jagannathan, Ravi & Runkle, David E, 1993. "On the Relation between the Expected Value and the Volatility of the Nominal Excess Return on Stocks," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(5), pages 1779-1801, December.
    29. Virginie Coudert & Cyriac Guillaumin & Hélène Raymond, 2014. "Looking at the other side of carry trades: Are there any safe haven currencies?," EconomiX Working Papers 2014-13, University of Paris Nanterre, EconomiX.
    30. Angelo Ranaldo & Paul Söderlind, 2010. "Safe Haven Currencies," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 14(3), pages 385-407.
    31. Bollerslev, Tim, 1986. "Generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 307-327, April.
    32. Avdulaj, Krenar & Barunik, Jozef, 2015. "Are benefits from oil–stocks diversification gone? New evidence from a dynamic copula and high frequency data," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 31-44.
    33. Peter Christoffersen & Vihang Errunza & Kris Jacobs & Hugues Langlois, 2012. "Is the Potential for International Diversification Disappearing? A Dynamic Copula Approach," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 25(12), pages 3711-3751.
    34. El Hedi Arouri, Mohamed & Lahiani, Amine & Nguyen, Duc Khuong, 2015. "World gold prices and stock returns in China: Insights for hedging and diversification strategies," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 273-282.
    35. Nelson, Daniel B & Cao, Charles Q, 1992. "Inequality Constraints in the Univariate GARCH Model," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 10(2), pages 229-235, April.
    36. Mathias Hoffmann & Rahel Suter, 2010. "The Swiss Franc Exchange Rate and Deviations from Uncovered Interest Parity: Global vs Domestic Factors," Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics (SJES), Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES), vol. 146(I), pages 349-371, March.
    37. Jian Hu, 2010. "Dependence structures in Chinese and US financial markets: a time-varying conditional copula approach," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(7), pages 561-583.
    38. Nguyen, Cuong & Bhatti, M. Ishaq & Komorníková, Magda & Komorník, Jozef, 2016. "Gold price and stock markets nexus under mixed-copulas," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 283-292.
    39. Thi Hong Van Hoang & Amine Lahiani & David Heller, 2016. "Is gold a hedge against inflation? New evidence from a nonlinear ARDL approach," Post-Print hal-02012307, HAL.
    40. Beatriz Vaz de Melo Mendes, 2005. "Computing Conditional VaR using Time-varying CopulasComputing Conditional VaR using Time-varying Copulas," Brazilian Review of Finance, Brazilian Society of Finance, vol. 3(2), pages 251-265.
    41. Jondeau, Eric & Rockinger, Michael, 2006. "The Copula-GARCH model of conditional dependencies: An international stock market application," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 25(5), pages 827-853, August.
    42. Hammoudeh, Shawkat & Yuan, Yuan, 2008. "Metal volatility in presence of oil and interest rate shocks," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(2), pages 606-620, March.
    43. Mr. Dennis P Botman & Mr. Irineu E de Carvalho Filho & Mr. Waikei R Lam, 2013. "The Curious Case of the Yen as a Safe Haven Currency: A Forensic Analysis," IMF Working Papers 2013/228, International Monetary Fund.
    44. Capie, Forrest & Mills, Terence C. & Wood, Geoffrey, 2005. "Gold as a hedge against the dollar," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 343-352, October.
    45. Mark, Joy, 2011. "Gold and the US dollar: Hedge or haven?," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 120-131, September.
    46. Beckmann, Joscha & Berger, Theo & Czudaj, Robert, 2015. "Does gold act as a hedge or a safe haven for stocks? A smooth transition approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 16-24.
    47. Habib, Maurizio M. & Stracca, Livio, 2012. "Getting beyond carry trade: What makes a safe haven currency?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(1), pages 50-64.
    48. Smales, L.A., 2019. "Bitcoin as a safe haven: Is it even worth considering?," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 385-393.
    49. Fang, Hong-Bin & Fang, Kai-Tai & Kotz, Samuel, 2002. "The Meta-elliptical Distributions with Given Marginals," Journal of Multivariate Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 82(1), pages 1-16, July.
    50. Ling Hu, 2006. "Dependence patterns across financial markets: a mixed copula approach," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(10), pages 717-729.
    51. Shahzad, Syed Jawad Hussain & Bouri, Elie & Roubaud, David & Kristoufek, Ladislav & Lucey, Brian, 2019. "Is Bitcoin a better safe-haven investment than gold and commodities?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 322-330.
    52. Zhang, Yue-Jun & Wei, Yi-Ming, 2010. "The crude oil market and the gold market: Evidence for cointegration, causality and price discovery," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 168-177, September.
    53. Beck, Roland & Rahbari, Ebrahim, 2011. "Optimal reserve composition in the presence of sudden stops," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 30(6), pages 1107-1127, October.
    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. Abhishek Subramanian & Parthajit Kayal, 2023. "Application of Volatility-Managed Portfolios in the Context of a Volatility Index," Working Papers 2023-242, Madras School of Economics,Chennai,India.
    2. Malvika Saraf & Parthajit Kayal, 2022. "How Much Does Volatility Influence Stock Market Returns? – Empirical Evidence from India," Working Papers 2022-215, Madras School of Economics,Chennai,India.
    3. Thillaikkoothan Palanichamy & Parthajit Kayal, 2022. "Multiple Dimensions of Cyclicality in Investing," Working Papers 2022-216, Madras School of Economics,Chennai,India.
    4. S. Pavithra & Parthajit Kayal, 2023. "A Study of Investment Style Timing of Mutual Funds in India," Asia-Pacific Financial Markets, Springer;Japanese Association of Financial Economics and Engineering, vol. 30(1), pages 49-72, March.
    5. Moinak Maiti & Parthajit Kayal, 2022. "Asymmetric Information Flow between Exchange Rate, Oil, and Gold: New Evidence from Transfer Entropy Approach," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 16(1), pages 1-14, December.

    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. Parthajit Kayal & Janani Sri SG, 2020. "Going Beyond Gold: Can Equities be Safe-Haven?," Working Papers 2020-203, Madras School of Economics,Chennai,India.
    2. Tachibana, Minoru, 2018. "Safe-haven and hedge currencies for the US, UK, and Euro area stock markets: A copula-based approach," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 82-96.
    3. Mokni, Khaled & Youssef, Manel & Ajmi, Ahdi Noomen, 2022. "COVID-19 pandemic and economic policy uncertainty: The first test on the hedging and safe haven properties of cryptocurrencies," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    4. Mohamed Arbi Madani & Zied Ftiti, 2019. "The Generalisation of the DMCA Coefficient to Serve Distinguishing Between Hedge and Safe Haven Capabilities of the Gold," Papers 1912.12590, arXiv.org.
    5. Marwa Talbi & Rihab Bedoui & Christian de Peretti & Lotfi Belkacem, 2021. "Is the role of precious metals as precious as they are? A vine copula and BiVaR approaches," Post-Print hal-03671370, HAL.
    6. Ihsan Erdem Kayral & Ahmed Jeribi & Sahar Loukil, 2023. "Are Bitcoin and Gold a Safe Haven during COVID-19 and the 2022 Russia–Ukraine War?," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 16(4), pages 1-22, April.
    7. Hasan, Md. Bokhtiar & Hassan, M. Kabir & Rashid, Md. Mamunur & Alhenawi, Yasser, 2021. "Are safe haven assets really safe during the 2008 global financial crisis and COVID-19 pandemic?," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    8. Syed Abul, Basher & Perry, Sadorsky, 2022. "Forecasting Bitcoin price direction with random forests: How important are interest rates, inflation, and market volatility?," MPRA Paper 113293, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Rizvi, Syed Kumail Abbas & Naqvi, Bushra & Mirza, Nawazish & Umar, Muhammad, 2022. "Safe haven properties of green, Islamic, and crypto assets and investor's proclivity towards treasury and gold," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C).
    10. Tachibana, Minoru, 2022. "Safe haven assets for international stock markets: A regime-switching factor copula approach," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    11. Talbi, Marwa & Bedoui, Rihab & de Peretti, Christian & Belkacem, Lotfi, 2021. "Is the role of precious metals as precious as they are? A vine copula and BiVaR approaches," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    12. Liu, Min & Lee, Chien-Chiang, 2022. "Is gold a long-run hedge, diversifier, or safe haven for oil? Empirical evidence based on DCC-MIDAS," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    13. Wang, Xinya & Lucey, Brian & Huang, Shupei, 2022. "Can gold hedge against oil price movements: Evidence from GARCH-EVT wavelet modeling," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 27(C).
    14. Ali, Sajid & Bouri, Elie & Czudaj, Robert Lukas & Shahzad, Syed Jawad Hussain, 2020. "Revisiting the valuable roles of commodities for international stock markets," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    15. Ji, Qiang & Zhang, Dayong & Zhao, Yuqian, 2020. "Searching for safe-haven assets during the COVID-19 pandemic," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).
    16. Mohamed Arbi Madani & Zied Ftiti, 2022. "Is gold a hedge or safe haven against oil and currency market movements? A revisit using multifractal approach," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 313(1), pages 367-400, June.
    17. Akhtaruzzaman, Md & Boubaker, Sabri & Lucey, Brian M. & Sensoy, Ahmet, 2021. "Is gold a hedge or a safe-haven asset in the COVID–19 crisis?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    18. Imran Yousaf & Vasilios Plakandaras & Elie Bouri & Rangan Gupta, 2022. "Hedge and Safe Haven Properties of Gold, US Treasury, Bitcoin, and Dollar/CHF against the FAANA Companies and S&P 500," Working Papers 202227, University of Pretoria, Department of Economics.
    19. Semeyutin, Artur & Downing, Gareth, 2022. "Co-jumps in the U.S. interest rates and precious metals markets and their implications for investors," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    20. Chemkha, Rahma & BenSaïda, Ahmed & Ghorbel, Ahmed & Tayachi, Tahar, 2021. "Hedge and safe haven properties during COVID-19: Evidence from Bitcoin and gold," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 71-85.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Coronavirus; volatility; yield; financial; crisis; co-movement; portfolio;
    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
    • 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:sae:emffin:v:21:y:2022:i:1:p:32-63. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.ifmr.ac.in .

    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.