Do positive and negative variations in stock indexes lead to depreciation in local currencies? A beyond symmetrical evidence from ASEAN-5 region

Preliminary studies overlooked the importance of the financial crisis in the asymmetric transmission of financial market shocks to FX market returns. Moreover, existing studies also concentrated on the response of aggregate equity market returns to the forex market returns rather than the vice versa asymmetric effect for the ASEAN-5 region. We utilised the panel based ARDL and NARDL framework using pooled mean group method for conducting this study. There are 415 observations spanning the pre-crisis period of January 2001 to December 2007. Furthermore, 595 and 1135 observations are taken into consideration when post-recessionary, and overall sampling periods of January 2010 to December 2019 and January 2001 to December 2019 are considered, correspondingly. Overall, the findings indicated that in the short run, only negative equity market returns caused depreciation in the local currencies of ASEAN-5 member countries during the pre-crisis period, whereas only positive shocks during the post-crisis regime appreciated the local currencies of ASEAN-5 member countries. Furthermore, only longer-term negative financial market shocks contribute to post-crisis local currency deflation in the ASEAN-5 member nations. This demonstrates that investors and exporters must consider the importance of the particulate crisis period when formulating forward currency arrangements.