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The Information Content of International Portfolio Flows

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Author Info
Kenneth A. Froot
Tarun Ramadorai

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Abstract

We examine the forecasting power of international portfolio flows for local equity markets and attempt to attribute it to either better information about fundamentals on the part of international investors, or to price pressure. Price pressure is a potential explanation because flows have positive contemporaneous price impacts and are strongly positively autocorrelated. We find that cross-border flows forecast both individual country equity market prices and associated US closed-end country fund prices, even after controlling for closed-end fund purchases. Cross-border flows have no discernable impact on the difference, the closed-end fund discount. This fact is consistent with the information story, which says that cross-border inflows predict no change in the discount, but forecast positive changes in both net asset values and closed-end fund prices. This fact also contradicts the price pressure story, which predicts that cross-border inflows increase local country equity prices, thereby increasing the closed-end fund discount. We also use our approach to test for the presence of trend following in cross-border flows based on relative, as well as absolute returns. Like other studies, we find evidence of trend following based on absolute returns. Interestingly, however, we find also that flows are trend reversing based on relative returns. Flows therefore seem to be stabilizing with respect to notions of relative, but not absolute, value.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 8472.

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Date of creation: Sep 2001
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:8472

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
G15 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - International Financial Markets
F21 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Investment; Long-Term Capital Movements

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References listed on IDEAS
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.:
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    Other versions:
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    Other versions:
Full references

Cited by:
(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. Kee-Hong Bae & Rene M. Stulz & Hongping Tan, 2005. "Do Local Analysts Know More? A Cross-Country Study of the Performance of Local Analysts and Foreign Analysts," NBER Working Papers 11697, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Kenneth A. Froot & Tarun Ramadorai, 2002. "Currency Returns, Institutional Investor Flows, and Exchange Rate Fundamentals," NBER Working Papers 9101, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  3. Kenneth A. Froot & Jessica D. Tjornhom, 2002. "Decomposing the Persistence of International Equity Flows," NBER Working Papers 9079, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Chan, Kalok & Menkveld, Albert J. & Yang, Zhishu, 2006. "Information Asymmetry and Asset Prices: Evidence from the China Foreign share discount," Serie Research Memoranda 0005, VU University Amsterdam, Faculty of Economics, Business Administration and Econometrics. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  5. John M. Griffin & Federico Nardari & Rene M. Stulz, 2002. "Daily Cross-Border Equity Flows: Pushed or Pulled?," NBER Working Papers 9000, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Rui Albuquerque & Gregory Bauer & Martin Schneider, 2004. "International Equity Flows and Returns: A Quantitative Equilibrium Approach," International Finance 0405006, EconWPA. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  7. Ramadorai, Tarun, 2006. "Persistence, Performance and Prices in Foreign Exchange Markets," CEPR Discussion Papers 5861, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Rafael Romeu, 2003. "An Intraday Pricing Model of Foreign Exchange Markets," IMF Working Papers 03/115, International Monetary Fund. [Downloadable!]
  9. Rui Albuquerque & Gregory Bauer & Martin Schneider, 2004. "Characterizing Asymmetric Information in International Equity Markets," International Finance 0405005, EconWPA. [Downloadable!]
  10. Albuquerque, Rui & Bauer, Gregor H & Schneider, Martin, 2006. "Global Private Information in International Equity Markets," CEPR Discussion Papers 5819, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  11. John Y. Campbell & Tarun Ramadorai & Tuomo O. Vuolteenaho, 2005. "Caught On Tape: Institutional Order Flow and Stock Returns," NBER Working Papers 11439, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  12. Juan Carlos Hatchondo, 2005. "Asymmetric information and the lack of international portfolio diversification," Working Paper 05-07, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond. [Downloadable!]
  13. Hyuk Choe & Bong-Chan Kho & Rene M. Stulz, 2004. "Do Domestic Investors Have an Edge? The Trading Experience of Foreign Investors in Korea," NBER Working Papers 10502, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  14. Bae, Kee-Hong & Stulz, Rene M. & Tan, Hongping, 2006. "Do Local Analysts Know More? A Cross-Country Study of the Performance of Local Analysts and Foreign Analysts," Working Paper Series 2005-18, Ohio State University, Charles A. Dice Center for Research in Financial Economics. [Downloadable!]
  15. Tongxuan Yang, 2003. "Defined Benefit Pension Plan Liabilities and International Asset Allocation," Working Papers wp058, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center. [Downloadable!]
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