IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/13739.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

High Idiosyncratic Volatility and Low Returns: International and Further U.S. Evidence

Author

Listed:
  • Andrew Ang
  • Robert J. Hodrick
  • Yuhang Xing
  • Xiaoyan Zhang

Abstract

Stocks with recent past high idiosyncratic volatility have low future average returns around the world. Across 23 developed markets, the difference in average returns between the extreme quintile portfolios sorted on idiosyncratic volatility is -1.31% per month, after controlling for world market, size, and value factors. The effect is individually significant in each G7 country. In the U.S., we rule out explanations based on trading frictions, information dissemination, and higher moments. There is strong comovement in the low returns to high idiosyncratic volatility stocks across countries, suggesting that broad, not easily diversifiable, factors may lie behind this phenomenon.

Suggested Citation

  • Andrew Ang & Robert J. Hodrick & Yuhang Xing & Xiaoyan Zhang, 2008. "High Idiosyncratic Volatility and Low Returns: International and Further U.S. Evidence," NBER Working Papers 13739, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13739
    Note: AP
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w13739.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Harrison Hong & Terence Lim & Jeremy C. Stein, 2000. "Bad News Travels Slowly: Size, Analyst Coverage, and the Profitability of Momentum Strategies," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(1), pages 265-295, February.
    2. Eugene F. Fama & Kenneth R. French, 1998. "Value versus Growth: The International Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(6), pages 1975-1999, December.
    3. John Y. Campbell & Martin Lettau & Burton G. Malkiel & Yexiao Xu, 2001. "Have Individual Stocks Become More Volatile? An Empirical Exploration of Idiosyncratic Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(1), pages 1-43, February.
    4. Jagannathan, Ravi & Wang, Zhenyu, 1996. "The Conditional CAPM and the Cross-Section of Expected Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(1), pages 3-53, March.
    5. David Easley & Soeren Hvidkjaer & Maureen O'Hara, 2002. "Is Information Risk a Determinant of Asset Returns?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(5), pages 2185-2221, October.
    6. Karl B. Diether & Christopher J. Malloy & Anna Scherbina, 2002. "Differences of Opinion and the Cross Section of Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(5), pages 2113-2141, October.
    7. Tversky, Amos & Kahneman, Daniel, 1992. "Advances in Prospect Theory: Cumulative Representation of Uncertainty," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 5(4), pages 297-323, October.
    8. Tobias Adrian & Joshua Rosenberg, 2008. "Stock Returns and Volatility: Pricing the Short‐Run and Long‐Run Components of Market Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(6), pages 2997-3030, December.
    9. Lesmond, David A & Ogden, Joseph P & Trzcinka, Charles A, 1999. "A New Estimate of Transaction Costs," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 12(5), pages 1113-1141.
    10. Banz, Rolf W., 1981. "The relationship between return and market value of common stocks," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 3-18, March.
    11. Merton, Robert C, 1987. "A Simple Model of Capital Market Equilibrium with Incomplete Information," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 42(3), pages 483-510, July.
    12. Amit Goyal & Pedro Santa-Clara, 2003. "Idiosyncratic Risk Matters!," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(3), pages 975-1008, June.
    13. Merton, Robert C, 1974. "On the Pricing of Corporate Debt: The Risk Structure of Interest Rates," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 29(2), pages 449-470, May.
    14. Geert Bekaert & Robert J. Hodrick & Xiaoyan Zhang, 2009. "International Stock Return Comovements," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(6), pages 2591-2626, December.
    15. Andrew Ang & Robert J. Hodrick & Yuhang Xing & Xiaoyan Zhang, 2006. "The Cross‐Section of Volatility and Expected Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(1), pages 259-299, February.
    16. Newey, Whitney & West, Kenneth, 2014. "A simple, positive semi-definite, heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation consistent covariance matrix," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 33(1), pages 125-132.
    17. 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.
    18. Timothy C. Johnson, 2004. "Forecast Dispersion and the Cross Section of Expected Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 59(5), pages 1957-1978, October.
    19. 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.
    20. David Easley & Maureen O'hara, 2004. "Information and the Cost of Capital," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 59(4), pages 1553-1583, August.
    21. K. Geert Rouwenhorst, 1998. "International Momentum Strategies," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(1), pages 267-284, February.
    22. Campbell R. Harvey & Akhtar Siddique, 2000. "Conditional Skewness in Asset Pricing Tests," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(3), pages 1263-1295, June.
    23. 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.
    24. Engle, Robert F, 1982. "Autoregressive Conditional Heteroscedasticity with Estimates of the Variance of United Kingdom Inflation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(4), pages 987-1007, July.
    25. Fama, Eugene F & French, Kenneth R, 1992. "The Cross-Section of Expected Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 47(2), pages 427-465, June.
    26. X. Frank Zhang, 2006. "Information Uncertainty and Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(1), pages 105-137, February.
    27. Kewei Hou & Tobias J. Moskowitz, 2005. "Market Frictions, Price Delay, and the Cross-Section of Expected Returns," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 18(3), pages 981-1020.
    28. Shanken, Jay, 1992. "On the Estimation of Beta-Pricing Models," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 5(1), pages 1-33.
    29. Heston, Steven L, 1993. "A Closed-Form Solution for Options with Stochastic Volatility with Applications to Bond and Currency Options," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 6(2), pages 327-343.
    30. Lo, Andrew W & MacKinlay, A Craig, 1990. "Data-Snooping Biases in Tests of Financial Asset Pricing Models," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 3(3), pages 431-467.
    31. Ledoit, Olivier & Santa-Clara, Pedro & Yan, Shu, 2002. "Relative Pricing of Options with Stochastic Volatility," University of California at Los Angeles, Anderson Graduate School of Management qt7jp8f42t, Anderson Graduate School of Management, UCLA.
    32. Campbell, John Y, 1993. "Intertemporal Asset Pricing without Consumption Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(3), pages 487-512, June.
    33. Baker, Malcolm & Coval, Joshua & Stein, Jeremy C., 2007. "Corporate financing decisions when investors take the path of least resistance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(2), pages 266-298, May.
    34. Miller, Edward M, 1977. "Risk, Uncertainty, and Divergence of Opinion," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 32(4), pages 1151-1168, September.
    35. 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.
    36. 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.
    37. Tarun Chordia & Sahn-Wook Huh & Avanidhar Subrahmanyam, 2007. "The Cross-Section of Expected Trading Activity," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 20(3), pages 709-740.
    38. Wei, Steven X. & Zhang, Chu, 2005. "Idiosyncratic risk does not matter: A re-examination of the relationship between average returns and average volatilities," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 603-621, March.
    39. Brennan, Michael J. & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 1995. "Investment analysis and price formation in securities markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 361-381, July.
    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. Amit Goyal, 2012. "Empirical cross-sectional asset pricing: a survey," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 26(1), pages 3-38, March.
    2. Avanidhar Subrahmanyam, 2010. "The Cross†Section of Expected Stock Returns: What Have We Learnt from the Past Twenty†Five Years of Research?," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 16(1), pages 27-42, January.
    3. Stefan Nagel, 2013. "Empirical Cross-Sectional Asset Pricing," Annual Review of Financial Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 5(1), pages 167-199, November.
    4. Hollstein, Fabian & Prokopczuk, Marcel & Wese Simen, Chardin, 2020. "Beta uncertainty," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    5. Andrew Ang & Robert J. Hodrick & Yuhang Xing & Xiaoyan Zhang, 2006. "The Cross‐Section of Volatility and Expected Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(1), pages 259-299, February.
    6. Adam Zaremba & Jacob Koby Shemer, 2018. "Price-Based Investment Strategies," Springer Books, Springer, number 978-3-319-91530-2, November.
    7. Kuntara Pukthuanthong-Le & Nuttawat Visaltanachoti, 2009. "Idiosyncratic volatility and stock returns: a cross country analysis," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(16), pages 1269-1281.
    8. Hollstein, Fabian & Nguyen, Duc Binh Benno & Prokopczuk, Marcel, 2019. "Asset prices and “the devil(s) you know”," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 20-35.
    9. Chung, Kee H. & Wang, Junbo & Wu, Chunchi, 2019. "Volatility and the cross-section of corporate bond returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(2), pages 397-417.
    10. Gregory Connor & Lisa R. Goldberg & Robert A. Korajczyk, 2010. "Portfolio Risk Analysis," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 9224.
    11. Andrew Ang & Joseph Chen & Yuhang Xing, 2006. "Downside Risk," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 19(4), pages 1191-1239.
      • Andrew Ang & Joseph Chen & Yuhang Xing, 2005. "Downside risk," Proceedings, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    12. Mohammadreza Tavakoli Baghdadabad & Girijasankar Mallik, 2018. "Global idiosyncratic risk moments," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 55(2), pages 731-764, September.
    13. Guo, Hui & Savickas, Robert, 2010. "Relation between time-series and cross-sectional effects of idiosyncratic variance on stock returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(7), pages 1637-1649, July.
    14. Guo, Hui & Qiu, Buhui, 2014. "Options-implied variance and future stock returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 93-113.
    15. Tyler Muir & Erkko Etula & Tobias Adrian, 2011. "Broker-Dealer Leverage and the Cross-Section of Stock Returns," 2011 Meeting Papers 1448, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    16. Kevin Aretz & Marc Aretz, 2016. "Which stocks drive the size, value, and momentum anomalies and for how long? Evidence from a statistical leverage analysis," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 30(1), pages 19-61, February.
    17. Zura Kakushadze, 2015. "Heterotic Risk Models," Papers 1508.04883, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2016.
    18. Zura Kakushadze & Willie Yu, 2016. "Statistical Risk Models," Papers 1602.08070, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2017.
    19. Constantinos Antoniou & John A. Doukas & Avanidhar Subrahmanyam, 2016. "Investor Sentiment, Beta, and the Cost of Equity Capital," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(2), pages 347-367, February.
    20. Zura Kakushadze & Willie Yu, 2016. "Multifactor Risk Models and Heterotic CAPM," Papers 1602.04902, arXiv.org, revised Mar 2016.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • F3 - International Economics - - International Finance
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G15 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - International Financial Markets

    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:13739. 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.