IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/glofin/v58y2023ics1044028323000893.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An examination of green bonds as a hedge and safe haven for international equity markets

Author

Listed:
  • Ren, Boru
  • Lucey, Brian
  • Luo, Qirui

Abstract

Green bonds are a type of fixed-income instrument that specifically designed to fund environmentally friendly projects. Investigating the performance of green bonds is essential to gain insights into the risk-return characteristics and dynamics within sustainable finance and their potential role in portfolio diversification. In this paper, we comprehensively examine the ability of green bonds to act as a hedge or a safe haven against nineteen international equity market movements (most of the G20 and Switzerland) over the 2014–2022 period. Using regression analysis, we find that green bonds had acted as a strong hedge for many countries but have lost such property for utmost after the COVID-19 outbreak, while they still provide safe haven benefit for many countries' equity indexes. By the use of a novel CAViaR-based TVP-VAR connectedness approach, we further examine the tail risk spillovers among green bond and international equities which extends the consideration in extreme loss (VaR) perspective. We show that the spillovers rapidly increased during the first wave of COVID-19 and has remained at relatively high level until recent days. In combination of all metrics, we argue that Saudi Arabia might be the only country that has received as good (or even better) protection from green bond in the post-pandemic era as (than) before. Overall, these should increase the attractiveness of green bonds as elements of a portfolio, enhancing the green transition.

Suggested Citation

  • Ren, Boru & Lucey, Brian & Luo, Qirui, 2023. "An examination of green bonds as a hedge and safe haven for international equity markets," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 58(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:glofin:v:58:y:2023:i:c:s1044028323000893
    DOI: 10.1016/j.gfj.2023.100894
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1044028323000893
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.gfj.2023.100894?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    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. Le, TN-Lan & Abakah, Emmanuel Joel Aikins & Tiwari, Aviral Kumar, 2021. "Time and frequency domain connectedness and spill-over among fintech, green bonds and cryptocurrencies in the age of the fourth industrial revolution," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    3. Miklesh Yadav & Nandita Mishra & Shruti Ashok, 2023. "Dynamic connectedness of green bond with financial markets of European countries under OECD economies," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 56(1), pages 609-631, February.
    4. Jiang, Yonghong & Wang, Jieru & Ao, Zhiming & Wang, Yujou, 2022. "The relationship between green bonds and conventional financial markets: Evidence from quantile-on-quantile and quantile coherence approaches," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    5. Diebold, Francis X. & Yılmaz, Kamil, 2014. "On the network topology of variance decompositions: Measuring the connectedness of financial firms," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 182(1), pages 119-134.
    6. Nelson, Daniel B, 1991. "Conditional Heteroskedasticity in Asset Returns: A New Approach," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 59(2), pages 347-370, March.
    7. Zerbib, Olivier David, 2019. "The effect of pro-environmental preferences on bond prices: Evidence from green bonds," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 39-60.
    8. Ratner, Mitchell & Chiu, Chih-Chieh (Jason), 2013. "Hedging stock sector risk with credit default swaps," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 18-25.
    9. Jozef Baruník & Tomáš Křehlík, 2018. "Measuring the Frequency Dynamics of Financial Connectedness and Systemic Risk," Journal of Financial Econometrics, Oxford University Press, vol. 16(2), pages 271-296.
    10. Abuzayed, Bana & Bouri, Elie & Al-Fayoumi, Nedal & Jalkh, Naji, 2021. "Systemic risk spillover across global and country stock markets during the COVID-19 pandemic," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 180-197.
    11. Helmut Lütkepohl, 1985. "Comparison Of Criteria For Estimating The Order Of A Vector Autoregressive Process," Journal of Time Series Analysis, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 6(1), pages 35-52, January.
    12. Clive Granger & Yongil Jeon, 2004. "Forecasting Performance of Information Criteria with Many Macro Series," Journal of Applied Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 31(10), pages 1227-1240.
    13. Guo, Dong & Zhou, Peng, 2021. "Green bonds as hedging assets before and after COVID: A comparative study between the US and China," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    14. Arif, Muhammad & Naeem, Muhammad Abubakr & Farid, Saqib & Nepal, Rabindra & Jamasb, Tooraj, 2022. "Diversifier or more? Hedge and safe haven properties of green bonds during COVID-19," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 168(C).
    15. Chopra, Monika & Mehta, Chhavi, 2023. "Going green: Do green bonds act as a hedge and safe haven for stock sector risk?," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 51(C).
    16. Elsayed, Ahmed H. & Naifar, Nader & Nasreen, Samia & Tiwari, Aviral Kumar, 2022. "Dependence structure and dynamic connectedness between green bonds and financial markets: Fresh insights from time-frequency analysis before and during COVID-19 pandemic," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(C).
    17. Demiralay, Sercan & Gencer, Hatice Gaye & Bayraci, Selcuk, 2022. "Carbon credit futures as an emerging asset: Hedging, diversification and downside risks," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    18. Pham, Linh, 2021. "Frequency connectedness and cross-quantile dependence between green bond and green equity markets," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    19. Reboredo, Juan C. & Ugolini, Andrea, 2020. "Price connectedness between green bond and financial markets," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 25-38.
    20. Reboredo, Juan C., 2018. "Green bond and financial markets: Co-movement, diversification and price spillover effects," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 38-50.
    21. Elliott, Graham & Rothenberg, Thomas J & Stock, James H, 1996. "Efficient Tests for an Autoregressive Unit Root," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(4), pages 813-836, July.
    22. Baele, Lieven, 2005. "Volatility Spillover Effects in European Equity Markets," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 40(2), pages 373-401, June.
    23. Yousaf, Imran & Suleman, Muhammad Tahir & Demirer, Riza, 2022. "Green investments: A luxury good or a financial necessity?," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C).
    24. Piñeiro-Chousa, Juan & López-Cabarcos, M. Ángeles & Šević, Aleksandar, 2022. "Green bond market and Sentiment: Is there a switching Behaviour?," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 520-527.
    25. Pham, Linh & Do, Hung Xuan, 2022. "Green bonds and implied volatilities: Dynamic causality, spillovers, and implications for portfolio management," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).
    26. 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.
    27. Li, Hong, 2020. "Volatility spillovers across European stock markets under the uncertainty of Brexit," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 1-12.
    28. Chatziantoniou, Ioannis & Gabauer, David & Perez de Gracia, Fernando, 2022. "Tail risk connectedness in the refined petroleum market: A first look at the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    29. Diebold, Francis X. & Yilmaz, Kamil, 2012. "Better to give than to receive: Predictive directional measurement of volatility spillovers," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 57-66.
    30. 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).
    31. Madurika Nanayakkara & Sisira Colombage, 2019. "Do investors in Green Bond market pay a premium? Global evidence," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(40), pages 4425-4437, August.
    32. Dong, Xiyong & Xiong, Youlin & Nie, Siyue & Yoon, Seong-Min, 2023. "Can bonds hedge stock market risks? Green bonds vs conventional bonds," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 52(C).
    33. Nikolaos Antonakakis & Ioannis Chatziantoniou & David Gabauer, 2020. "Refined Measures of Dynamic Connectedness based on Time-Varying Parameter Vector Autoregressions," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-23, April.
    34. Urquhart, Andrew & Zhang, Hanxiong, 2019. "Is Bitcoin a hedge or safe haven for currencies? An intraday analysis," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 49-57.
    35. Peng, Xiaofan, 2020. "Do precious metals act as hedges or safe havens for China's financial markets?," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 37(C).
    36. Imran, Zulfiqar Ali & Ahad, Muhammad, 2023. "Safe-haven properties of green bonds for industrial sectors (GICS) in the United States: Evidence from Covid-19 pandemic and Global Financial Crisis," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 210(C), pages 408-423.
    37. Olivier David Zerbib, 2019. "The effect of pro-environmental preferences on bond prices: Evidence from green bonds," Post-Print halshs-02008641, HAL.
    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. Lucey, Brian & Ren, Boru, 2023. "Time-varying tail risk connectedness among sustainability-related products and fossil energy investments," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    2. Kamal, Javed Bin & Hassan, M. Kabir, 2022. "Asymmetric connectedness between cryptocurrency environment attention index and green assets," The Journal of Economic Asymmetries, Elsevier, vol. 25(C).
    3. Qi, Xiaohong & Zhang, Guofu, 2022. "Dynamic connectedness of China’s green bonds and asset classes," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    4. Huang, Zishan & Zhu, Huiming & Hau, Liya & Deng, Xi, 2023. "Time-frequency co-movement and network connectedness between green bond and financial asset markets: Evidence from multiscale TVP-VAR analysis," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    5. Munir Khamis & Dalal Aassouli, 2023. "The Eligibility of Green Bonds as Safe Haven Assets: A Systematic Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(8), pages 1-27, April.
    6. Ren, Boru & Lucey, Brian, 2022. "A clean, green haven?—Examining the relationship between clean energy, clean and dirty cryptocurrencies," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    7. Tiwari, Aviral Kumar & Abakah, Emmanuel Joel Aikins & Doğan, Buhari & Ghosh, Sudeshna, 2023. "Sustainable debt and gas markets: A new look using the time-varying wavelet-windowed cross-correlation approach," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    8. Khalfaoui, Rabeh & Mefteh-Wali, Salma & Dogan, Buhari & Ghosh, Sudeshna, 2023. "Extreme spillover effect of COVID-19 pandemic-related news and cryptocurrencies on green bond markets: A quantile connectedness analysis," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 86(C).
    9. Naeem, Muhammad Abubakr & Farid, Saqib & Ferrer, Román & Shahzad, Syed Jawad Hussain, 2021. "Comparative efficiency of green and conventional bonds pre- and during COVID-19: An asymmetric multifractal detrended fluctuation analysis," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).
    10. Chaofeng Tang & Kentaka Aruga & Yi Hu, 2023. "The Dynamic Correlation and Volatility Spillover among Green Bonds, Clean Energy Stock, and Fossil Fuel Market," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(8), pages 1-23, April.
    11. Pham, Linh & Cepni, Oguzhan, 2022. "Extreme directional spillovers between investor attention and green bond markets," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 186-210.
    12. Zhou, Yang & Xie, Chi & Wang, Gang-Jin & Zhu, You & Uddin, Gazi Salah, 2023. "Analysing and forecasting co-movement between innovative and traditional financial assets based on complex network and machine learning," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    13. Mensi, Walid & Vo, Xuan Vinh & Ko, Hee-Un & Kang, Sang Hoon, 2023. "Frequency spillovers between green bonds, global factors and stock market before and during COVID-19 crisis," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 558-580.
    14. Pham, Linh & Do, Hung Xuan, 2022. "Green bonds and implied volatilities: Dynamic causality, spillovers, and implications for portfolio management," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).
    15. Yadav, Mikesh Prasad & Pandey, Asheesh & Taghizadeh-Hesary, Farhad & Arya, Vandana & Mishra, Nandita, 2023. "Volatility spillover of green bond with renewable energy and crypto market," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 212(C), pages 928-939.
    16. Román Ferrer & Rafael Benítez & Vicente J. Bolós, 2021. "Interdependence between Green Financial Instruments and Major Conventional Assets: A Wavelet-Based Network Analysis," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 9(8), pages 1-20, April.
    17. Umar, Zaghum & Abrar, Afsheen & Hadhri, Sinda & Sokolova, Tatiana, 2023. "The connectedness of oil shocks, green bonds, sukuks and conventional bonds," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    18. Cepni, Oguzhan & Demirer, Riza & Pham, Linh & Rognone, Lavinia, 2023. "Climate uncertainty and information transmissions across the conventional and ESG assets," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    19. Kocaarslan, Baris & Mushtaq, Rizwan, 2024. "The impact of liquidity conditions on the time-varying link between U.S. municipal green bonds and major risky markets during the COVID-19 crisis: A machine learning approach," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 184(C).
    20. Tiwari, Aviral Kumar & Aikins Abakah, Emmanuel Joel & Adekoya, Oluwasegun B. & Hammoudeh, Shawkat, 2023. "What do we know about the price spillover between green bonds and Islamic stocks and stock market indices?," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Green bond; Hedge; Safe haven; Spillovers; Connectedness; Stock markets; Uncertainty;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C5 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling
    • C32 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes; State Space Models
    • F3 - International Economics - - International Finance
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • 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:eee:glofin:v:58:y:2023:i:c:s1044028323000893. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620162 .

    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.