IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/11169.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Explaining Returns with Cash-Flow Proxies

Author

Listed:
  • Peter Hecht
  • Tuomo Vuolteenaho

Abstract

Stock returns are correlated with contemporaneous earnings growth, dividend growth, future real activity, and other cash-flow proxies. The correlation between cash-flow proxies and stock returns may arise from association of cash-flow proxies with one-period expected returns, cash-flow news, and/or expected-return news. We use Campbell's (1991) return decomposition to measure the relative importance of these three effects in regressions of returns on cash-flow proxies. In some of the popular specifications, variables that are motivated as proxies for cash-flow news also track a nontrivial proportion of one-period expected returns and expected-return news. As a result, the R2 from a regression of returns on cash-flow proxies may overstate or understate the importance of cash-flow news as a source of return variance.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter Hecht & Tuomo Vuolteenaho, 2005. "Explaining Returns with Cash-Flow Proxies," NBER Working Papers 11169, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11169
    Note: AP
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w11169.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Beneish, Messod D & Harvey, Campbell R, 1998. "Measurement Error and Nonlinearity in the Earnings-Returns Relation," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 11(3), pages 219-247, November.
    2. Tuomo Vuolteenaho, 2002. "What Drives Firm‐Level Stock Returns?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(1), pages 233-264, February.
    3. Campbell, John Y, 1991. "A Variance Decomposition for Stock Returns," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 101(405), pages 157-179, March.
    4. John Campbell & Jianping Mei, 1993. "Where do Betas Come From? Asset Price Dynamics and the Sources of Systematic Risk," NBER Working Papers 4329, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. John Y. Campbell, Robert J. Shiller, 1988. "The Dividend-Price Ratio and Expectations of Future Dividends and Discount Factors," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 1(3), pages 195-228.
    6. Bhandari, Laxmi Chand, 1988. " Debt/Equity Ratio and Expected Common Stock Returns: Empirical Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 43(2), pages 507-528, June.
    7. John H. Cochrane, 1994. "Permanent and Transitory Components of GNP and Stock Prices," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 109(1), pages 241-265.
    8. Schwert, G William, 1990. "Stock Returns and Real Activity: A Century of Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 45(4), pages 1237-1257, September.
    9. Beaver, Wh & Clarke, R & Wright, Wf, 1979. "Association Between Unsystematic Security Returns And The Magnitude Of Earnings Forecast Errors," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 17(2), pages 316-340.
    10. 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.
    11. De Bondt, Werner F M & Thaler, Richard, 1985. "Does the Stock Market Overreact?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 40(3), pages 793-805, July.
    12. Cohen, Randolph B. & Gompers, Paul A. & Vuolteenaho, Tuomo, 2002. "Who underreacts to cash-flow news? evidence from trading between individuals and institutions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2-3), pages 409-462.
    13. Fama, Eugene F, 1990. "Stock Returns, Expected Returns, and Real Activity," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 45(4), pages 1089-1108, September.
    14. Haugen, Robert A. & Baker, Nardin L., 1996. "Commonality in the determinants of expected stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(3), pages 401-439, July.
    15. Ball, R. & Kothari, S.P. & Watts, R.l., 1990. "Economic Determinants of the Relation Between Earnings Changes and Stock Returns," Papers 91-04, Rochester, Business - Managerial Economics Research Center.
    16. Collins, Daniel W. & Kothari, S. P., 1989. "An analysis of intertemporal and cross-sectional determinants of earnings response coefficients," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(2-3), pages 143-181, July.
    17. Lev, B, 1989. "On The Usefulness Of Earnings And Earnings Research - Lessons And Directions From 2 Decades Of Empirical-Research," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27, pages 153-192.
    18. 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.
    19. Campbell, John Y & Ammer, John, 1993. "What Moves the Stock and Bond Markets? A Variance Decomposition for Long-Term Asset Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(1), pages 3-37, March.
    20. Campbell, John Y & Mei, Jianping, 1993. "Where Do Betas Come From? Asset Price Dynamics and the," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 6(3), pages 567-592.
    21. Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Titman, Sheridan, 1993. "Returns to Buying Winners and Selling Losers: Implications for Stock Market Efficiency," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(1), pages 65-91, March.
    22. Freeman, Rn & Tse, Sy, 1992. "A Nonlinear Model Of Security Price Responses To Unexpected Earnings," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(2), pages 185-209.
    23. Easton, Pd & Harris, Ts, 1991. "Earnings As An Explanatory Variable For Returns," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(1), pages 19-36.
    24. Swamy, P A V B, 1970. "Efficient Inference in a Random Coefficient Regression Model," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 38(2), pages 311-323, March.
    25. Beaver, William & Lambert, Richard & Morse, Dale, 1980. "The information content of security prices," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 2(1), pages 3-28, March.
    26. Lang, M, 1991. "Time-Varying Stock-Price Response To Earnings Induced By Uncertainty About The Time-Series Process Of Earnings," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(2), pages 229-257.
    27. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1989. "Business conditions and expected returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 23-49, November.
    28. Kothari, S. P. & Shanken, Jay, 1992. "Stock return variation and expected dividends : A time-series and cross-sectional analysis," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 177-210, April.
    29. Collins, Daniel W. & Kothari, S. P. & Shanken, Jay & Sloan, Richard G., 1994. "Lack of timeliness and noise as explanations for the low contemporaneuos return-earnings association," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 289-324, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Kothari, S. P., 2001. "Capital markets research in accounting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1-3), pages 105-231, September.
    2. Gil Sadka, 2007. "Understanding Stock Price Volatility: The Role of Earnings," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(1), pages 199-228, March.
    3. Castrén, Olli & Fitzpatrick, Trevor & Sydow, Matthias, 2006. "What drives EU banks' stock returns? Bank-level evidence using the dynamic dividend-discount model," Working Paper Series 677, European Central Bank.
    4. Sadka, Gil & Sadka, Ronnie, 2009. "Predictability and the earnings-returns relation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(1), pages 87-106, October.
    5. Ray Ball & Gil Sadka & Ronnie Sadka, 2009. "Aggregate Earnings and Asset Prices," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(5), pages 1097-1133, December.
    6. Tuomo Vuolteenaho, 2002. "What Drives Firm‐Level Stock Returns?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(1), pages 233-264, February.
    7. Tuomo Vuolteenaho, 2001. "What Drives Firm-Level Stock Returns?," NBER Working Papers 8240, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. John Ammer & Jianping Mei, 1995. "Strategic returns to international diversification: An application to the equity markets of Europe, Japan and North America," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 1(1), pages 49-59, March.
    9. Kothari, S. P. & Zimmerman, Jerold L., 1995. "Price and return models," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 155-192, September.
    10. John H. Cochrane, 2011. "Discount Rates," NBER Working Papers 16972, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. van Zundert, Jeroen, 2018. "Empirical studies on the cross-section of corporate bond and stock markets," Other publications TiSEM 338205fc-a031-4e06-a636-9, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    12. Stefano Gubellini, 2014. "Conditioning information and cross-sectional anomalies," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 43(3), pages 529-569, October.
    13. Wu, Ming & Ohk, Kiyool & Ko, Kwangsoo, 2019. "Are cash-flow betas really bad? Evidence from the Greater Chinese stock markets," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 58-68.
    14. John Y. Campbell & John Cochrane, 1999. "Force of Habit: A Consumption-Based Explanation of Aggregate Stock Market Behavior," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 107(2), pages 205-251, April.
    15. Martin Lettau & Jessica A. Wachter, 2007. "Why Is Long‐Horizon Equity Less Risky? A Duration‐Based Explanation of the Value Premium," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(1), pages 55-92, February.
    16. John Y. Campbell & Christopher Polk & Tuomo Vuolteenaho, 2010. "Growth or Glamour? Fundamentals and Systematic Risk in Stock Returns," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 23(1), pages 305-344, January.
    17. John Y. Campbell & Tuomo Vuolteenaho, 2004. "Bad Beta, Good Beta," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(5), pages 1249-1275, December.
    18. Fernando Rubio, 2005. "Eficiencia De Mercado, Administracion De Carteras De Fondos Y Behavioural Finance," Finance 0503028, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 23 Jul 2005.
    19. Committee, Nobel Prize, 2013. "Understanding Asset Prices," Nobel Prize in Economics documents 2013-1, Nobel Prize Committee.
    20. Doina Chichernea & Collin Gilstrap & Kershen Huang & Alex Petkevich, 2019. "Who Reacts to News?," Quarterly Journal of Finance (QJF), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 9(01), pages 1-43, March.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • E44 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Financial Markets and the Macroeconomy
    • G10 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:nbr:nberwo:11169. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.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.