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Financial Asset Returns, Direction-of-Change Forecasting, and Volatility Dynamics

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Author Info
Peter F. Christoffersen
Francis X. Diebold

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Abstract

We consider three sets of phenomena that feature prominently and separately in the financial economics literature: conditional mean dependence (or lack thereof) in asset returns, dependence (and hence forecastability) in asset return signs, and dependence (and hence forecastability) in asset return volatilities. We show that they are very much interrelated, and we explore the relationships in detail. Among other things, we show that: (a) Volatility dependence produces sign dependence, so long as expected returns are nonzero, so that one should expect sign dependence, given the overwhelming evidence of volatility dependence; (b) The standard finding of little or no conditional mean dependence is entirely consistent with a significant degree of sign dependence and volatility dependence; (c) Sign dependence is not likely to be found via analysis of sign autocorrelations, runs tests, or traditional market timing tests, because of the special nonlinear nature of sign dependence; (d) Sign dependence is not likely to be found in very high-frequency (e.g., daily) or very low-frequency (e.g., annual) returns; instead, it is more likely to be found at intermediate return horizons; (e) Sign dependence is very much present in actual U.S. equity returns, and its properties match closely our theoretical predictions; (f) The link between volatility forecastability and sign forecastability remains intact in conditionally non-Gaussian environments, as for example with time-varying conditional skewness and/or kurtosis.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 10009.

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Date of creation: Oct 2003
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:10009

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G1 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets

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Full references

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(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. Gilbert W. Bassett Jr & Roger Koenker & Gregory Kordas, 2004. "Pessimistic portfolio allocation and Choquet expected utility," CeMMAP working papers CWP09/04, Centre for Microdata Methods and Practice, Institute for Fiscal Studies. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  2. Pedro N. Rodríguez, & Simón Sosvilla-Rivero, 2006. "Forecasting Stock Price Changes: Is it Possible?," Working Papers 2006-22, FEDEA. [Downloadable!]
  3. Stanislav Anatolyev, 2006. "Nonparametric retrospection and monitoring of predictability of financial returns," Working Papers w0071, Center for Economic and Financial Research (CEFIR). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  4. Massimo Guidolin & Allan Timmerman, 2005. "Term structure of risk under alternative econometric specifications," Working Papers 2005-001, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  5. Bekiros, S. & Georgoutsos, D., 2006. "Direction-of-Change Forecasting using a Volatility- Based Recurrent Neural Network," CeNDEF Working Papers 06-16, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Center for Nonlinear Dynamics in Economics and Finance. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  6. Peter F. Christoffersen & Francis X. Diebold & Roberto S. Mariano & Anthony S. Tay & Yiu Kuen Tse, 2006. "Direction-of-Change Forecasts Based on Conditional Variance, Skewness and Kurtosis Dynamics: International Evidence," PIER Working Paper Archive 06-016, Penn Institute for Economic Research, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania. [Downloadable!]
  7. Stanislav Anatolyev & Nikolay Gospodinov, 2007. "Modeling Financial Return Dynamics by Decomposition," Working Papers w0095, Center for Economic and Financial Research (CEFIR). [Downloadable!]
  8. Dimitrios Thomakos & Tao Wang, 2007. "'Optimal' Probabilistic Predictions for Financial Returns," Working Papers 0006, University of Peloponnese, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
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