IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/finana/v63y2019icp147-159.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Today I got a million, tomorrow, I don't know: On the predictability of cryptocurrencies by means of Google search volume

Author

Listed:
  • Bleher, Johannes
  • Dimpfl, Thomas

Abstract

We evaluate the usefulness of Google search volume to predict returns and volatility of multiple cryptocurrencies. The analysis is based on a new algorithm which allows to construct multi-annual, consistent time series of Google search volume indices (SVIs) on various frequencies. As cryptocurrencies are actively traded on a continuous basis and react very fast to new information, we conduct the analysis initially on a daily basis, lifting the data imposed restriction faced by previous research. In line with the literature on financial markets, we find that returns are not predictable while volatility is predictable to some extent. We discuss a number of reasons why the predictive power is poor. One aspect is the observational frequency which is therefore varied. The results of unpredictable cryptocurrency returns hold on higher (hourly) and lower (weekly) frequencies. Volatility, in contrast, is predictable on all frequencies and we document an increasing accuracy of the forecast when the sampling frequency is lowered.

Suggested Citation

  • Bleher, Johannes & Dimpfl, Thomas, 2019. "Today I got a million, tomorrow, I don't know: On the predictability of cryptocurrencies by means of Google search volume," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 147-159.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:finana:v:63:y:2019:i:c:p:147-159
    DOI: 10.1016/j.irfa.2019.03.003
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1057521918304198
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.irfa.2019.03.003?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. David Garcia & Claudio Juan Tessone & Pavlin Mavrodiev & Nicolas Perony, 2014. "The digital traces of bubbles: feedback cycles between socio-economic signals in the Bitcoin economy," Papers 1408.1494, arXiv.org.
    2. Pavel Ciaian & Miroslava Rajcaniova & d’Artis Kancs, 2016. "The economics of BitCoin price formation," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(19), pages 1799-1815, April.
    3. Panagiotidis, Theodore & Stengos, Thanasis & Vravosinos, Orestis, 2018. "On the determinants of bitcoin returns: A LASSO approach," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 235-240.
    4. Zhi Da & Joseph Engelberg & Pengjie Gao, 2015. "Editor's Choice The Sum of All FEARS Investor Sentiment and Asset Prices," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(1), pages 1-32.
    5. Corbet, Shaen & Lucey, Brian & Yarovaya, Larisa, 2018. "Datestamping the Bitcoin and Ethereum bubbles," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 81-88.
    6. Urquhart, Andrew, 2018. "What causes the attention of Bitcoin?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 40-44.
    7. Clark, Todd E. & West, Kenneth D., 2007. "Approximately normal tests for equal predictive accuracy in nested models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 138(1), pages 291-311, May.
    8. Zhang, Wei & Wang, Pengfei & Li, Xiao & Shen, Dehua, 2018. "Quantifying the cross-correlations between online searches and Bitcoin market," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 509(C), pages 657-672.
    9. John H. Cochrane, 2008. "The Dog That Did Not Bark: A Defense of Return Predictability," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 21(4), pages 1533-1575, July.
    10. Thierry Foucault & David Sraer & David J. Thesmar, 2011. "Individual Investors and Volatility," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 66(4), pages 1369-1406, August.
    11. Thomas Dimpfl & Stephan Jank, 2016. "Can Internet Search Queries Help to Predict Stock Market Volatility?," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 22(2), pages 171-192, March.
    12. Parkinson, Michael, 1980. "The Extreme Value Method for Estimating the Variance of the Rate of Return," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 53(1), pages 61-65, January.
    13. Matthias Bank & Martin Larch & Georg Peter, 2011. "Google search volume and its influence on liquidity and returns of German stocks," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 25(3), pages 239-264, September.
    14. Clark, Todd E. & West, Kenneth D., 2006. "Using out-of-sample mean squared prediction errors to test the martingale difference hypothesis," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 135(1-2), pages 155-186.
    15. Alan Kirman, 1993. "Ants, Rationality, and Recruitment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(1), pages 137-156.
    16. Helmut Lütkepohl & Fang Xu, 2012. "The role of the log transformation in forecasting economic variables," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 42(3), pages 619-638, June.
    17. David Garcia & Claudio Tessone & Pavlin Mavrodiev & Nicolas Perony, "undated". "The digital traces of bubbles: feedback cycles between socio-economic signals in the Bitcoin economy," Working Papers ETH-RC-14-001, ETH Zurich, Chair of Systems Design.
    18. Patton, Andrew J., 2011. "Volatility forecast comparison using imperfect volatility proxies," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 160(1), pages 246-256, January.
    19. Alfarano, Simone & Lux, Thomas & Wagner, Friedrich, 2008. "Time variation of higher moments in a financial market with heterogeneous agents: An analytical approach," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 101-136, January.
    20. David Garcia & Frank Schweitzer, 2015. "Social signals and algorithmic trading of Bitcoin," Papers 1506.01513, arXiv.org, revised Sep 2015.
    21. Jacob A. Mincer & Victor Zarnowitz, 1969. "The Evaluation of Economic Forecasts," NBER Chapters, in: Economic Forecasts and Expectations: Analysis of Forecasting Behavior and Performance, pages 3-46, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    22. Garman, Mark B & Klass, Michael J, 1980. "On the Estimation of Security Price Volatilities from Historical Data," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 53(1), pages 67-78, January.
    23. Hyndman, Rob J. & Khandakar, Yeasmin, 2008. "Automatic Time Series Forecasting: The forecast Package for R," Journal of Statistical Software, Foundation for Open Access Statistics, vol. 27(i03).
    24. Marcelo S. Perlin & João F. Caldeira & André A. P. Santos & Martin Pontuschka, 2017. "Can We Predict the Financial Markets Based on Google's Search Queries?," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(4), pages 454-467, July.
    25. Hyunyoung Choi & Hal Varian, 2012. "Predicting the Present with Google Trends," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 88(s1), pages 2-9, June.
    26. Jacob A. Mincer, 1969. "Economic Forecasts and Expectations: Analysis of Forecasting Behavior and Performance," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number minc69-1.
    27. Aaron Yelowitz & Matthew Wilson, 2015. "Characteristics of Bitcoin users: an analysis of Google search data," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(13), pages 1030-1036, September.
    28. Dastgir, Shabbir & Demir, Ender & Downing, Gareth & Gozgor, Giray & Lau, Chi Keung Marco, 2019. "The causal relationship between Bitcoin attention and Bitcoin returns: Evidence from the Copula-based Granger causality test," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 160-164.
    29. Baur, Dirk G. & Dimpfl, Thomas, 2018. "Asymmetric volatility in cryptocurrencies," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 173(C), pages 148-151.
    30. Jeremy Ginsberg & Matthew H. Mohebbi & Rajan S. Patel & Lynnette Brammer & Mark S. Smolinski & Larry Brilliant, 2009. "Detecting influenza epidemics using search engine query data," Nature, Nature, vol. 457(7232), pages 1012-1014, February.
    31. Yang, Dennis & Zhang, Qiang, 2000. "Drift-Independent Volatility Estimation Based on High, Low, Open, and Close Prices," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 73(3), pages 477-491, July.
    32. Panagiotidis, Theodore & Stengos, Thanasis & Vravosinos, Orestis, 2019. "The effects of markets, uncertainty and search intensity on bitcoin returns," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 220-242.
    33. Baur, Dirk G. & Hong, KiHoon & Lee, Adrian D., 2018. "Bitcoin: Medium of exchange or speculative assets?," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 177-189.
    34. Hailiang Chen & Prabuddha De & Yu (Jeffrey) Hu & Byoung-Hyoun Hwang, 2014. "Wisdom of Crowds: The Value of Stock Opinions Transmitted Through Social Media," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(5), pages 1367-1403.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Foglia, Matteo & Miglietta, Federica, 2024. "Does every cloud (bubble) have a silver lining? An investigation of ESG financial markets," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C).
    2. Smales, L.A., 2022. "Investor attention in cryptocurrency markets," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    3. Al Guindy, Mohamed, 2021. "Cryptocurrency price volatility and investor attention," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 556-570.
    4. Liu, Jian & Julaiti, Jiansuer & Gou, Shangde, 2024. "Decomposing interconnectedness: A study of cryptocurrency spillover effects in global financial markets," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    5. Nakagawa, Kei & Sakemoto, Ryuta, 2022. "Market uncertainty and correlation between Bitcoin and Ether," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    6. Lyócsa, Štefan & Plíhal, Tomáš, 2022. "Russia’s ruble during the onset of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in early 2022: The role of implied volatility and attention," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    7. Makridis, Christos A. & Fröwis, Michael & Sridhar, Kiran & Böhme, Rainer, 2023. "The rise of decentralized cryptocurrency exchanges: Evaluating the role of airdrops and governance tokens," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    8. Prange, Philipp, 2021. "Does online investor attention drive the co-movement of stock-, commodity-, and energy markets? Insights from Google searches," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(C).
    9. Ghosh, Indranil & Alfaro-Cortés, Esteban & Gámez, Matías & García-Rubio, Noelia, 2023. "Prediction and interpretation of daily NFT and DeFi prices dynamics: Inspection through ensemble machine learning & XAI," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    10. Hachicha, Fatma & Masmoudi, Afif & Abid, Ilyes & Obeid, Hassan, 2023. "Herding behavior in exploring the predictability of price clustering in cryptocurrency market," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 57(C).
    11. Ding, Qian & Huang, Jianbai & Zhang, Hongwei, 2022. "Time-frequency spillovers among carbon, fossil energy and clean energy markets: The effects of attention to climate change," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    12. Böyükaslan, Adem & Ecer, Fatih, 2021. "Determination of drivers for investing in cryptocurrencies through a fuzzy full consistency method-Bonferroni (FUCOM-F’B) framework," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    13. Khaskheli, Asadullah & Zhang, Hongyu & Raza, Syed Ali & Khan, Komal Akram, 2022. "Assessing the influence of news indicator on volatility of precious metals prices through GARCH-MIDAS model: A comparative study of pre and during COVID-19 period," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    14. Almeida, José & Gonçalves, Tiago Cruz, 2023. "A systematic literature review of investor behavior in the cryptocurrency markets," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(C).
    15. Thomas Dimpfl & Stefania Odelli, 2020. "Bitcoin Price Risk—A Durations Perspective," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-18, July.
    16. Salisu, Afees A. & Ogbonna, Ahamuefula E. & Adewuyi, Adeolu, 2020. "Google trends and the predictability of precious metals," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    17. Behrendt, Simon & Prange, Philipp, 2021. "What are you searching for? On the equivalence of proxies for online investor attention," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 38(C).

    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. Bleher, Johannes & Dimpfl, Thomas, 2022. "Knitting Multi-Annual High-Frequency Google Trends to Predict Inflation and Consumption," Econometrics and Statistics, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 1-26.
    2. Flori, Andrea, 2019. "News and subjective beliefs: A Bayesian approach to Bitcoin investments," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 336-356.
    3. Parthajit Kayal & Purnima Rohilla, 2021. "Bitcoin in the economics and finance literature: a survey," SN Business & Economics, Springer, vol. 1(7), pages 1-21, July.
    4. Panagiotidis, Theodore & Stengos, Thanasis & Vravosinos, Orestis, 2019. "The effects of markets, uncertainty and search intensity on bitcoin returns," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 220-242.
    5. Aurelio F. Bariviera & Ignasi Merediz‐Solà, 2021. "Where Do We Stand In Cryptocurrencies Economic Research? A Survey Based On Hybrid Analysis," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(2), pages 377-407, April.
    6. Thomas Dimpfl & Tobias Langen, 2019. "How Unemployment Affects Bond Prices: A Mixed Frequency Google Nowcasting Approach," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 54(2), pages 551-573, August.
    7. Andrea Flori, 2019. "Cryptocurrencies In Finance: Review And Applications," International Journal of Theoretical and Applied Finance (IJTAF), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 22(05), pages 1-22, August.
    8. Parthajit Kayal & G. Balasubramanian, 2021. "Excess Volatility in Bitcoin: Extreme Value Volatility Estimation," IIM Kozhikode Society & Management Review, , vol. 10(2), pages 222-231, July.
    9. Ahmed, Walid M.A., 2022. "Robust drivers of Bitcoin price movements: An extreme bounds analysis," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    10. Suardi, Sandy & Rasel, Atiqur Rahman & Liu, Bin, 2022. "On the predictive power of tweet sentiments and attention on bitcoin," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 289-301.
    11. Xun Zhang & Fengbin Lu & Rui Tao & Shouyang Wang, 2021. "The time-varying causal relationship between the Bitcoin market and internet attention," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 7(1), pages 1-19, December.
    12. Böyükaslan, Adem & Ecer, Fatih, 2021. "Determination of drivers for investing in cryptocurrencies through a fuzzy full consistency method-Bonferroni (FUCOM-F’B) framework," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    13. Helder Sebastião & Pedro Godinho, 2021. "Forecasting and trading cryptocurrencies with machine learning under changing market conditions," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 7(1), pages 1-30, December.
    14. Thomas Dimpfl & Stephan Jank, 2016. "Can Internet Search Queries Help to Predict Stock Market Volatility?," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 22(2), pages 171-192, March.
    15. Gaies, Brahim & Nakhli, Mohamed Sahbi & Sahut, Jean Michel & Guesmi, Khaled, 2021. "Is Bitcoin rooted in confidence? – Unraveling the determinants of globalized digital currencies," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 172(C).
    16. Kristjanpoller, Werner & Bouri, Elie & Takaishi, Tetsuya, 2020. "Cryptocurrencies and equity funds: Evidence from an asymmetric multifractal analysis," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 545(C).
    17. Petropoulos, Fotios & Apiletti, Daniele & Assimakopoulos, Vassilios & Babai, Mohamed Zied & Barrow, Devon K. & Ben Taieb, Souhaib & Bergmeir, Christoph & Bessa, Ricardo J. & Bijak, Jakub & Boylan, Joh, 2022. "Forecasting: theory and practice," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 705-871.
      • Fotios Petropoulos & Daniele Apiletti & Vassilios Assimakopoulos & Mohamed Zied Babai & Devon K. Barrow & Souhaib Ben Taieb & Christoph Bergmeir & Ricardo J. Bessa & Jakub Bijak & John E. Boylan & Jet, 2020. "Forecasting: theory and practice," Papers 2012.03854, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2022.
    18. Zhang, Wei & Wang, Pengfei & Li, Xiao & Shen, Dehua, 2018. "Quantifying the cross-correlations between online searches and Bitcoin market," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 509(C), pages 657-672.
    19. Kumar, Dilip, 2015. "Sudden changes in extreme value volatility estimator: Modeling and forecasting with economic significance analysis," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 354-371.
    20. Halousková, Martina & Stašek, Daniel & Horváth, Matúš, 2022. "The role of investor attention in global asset price variation during the invasion of Ukraine," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Bitcoin; Cryptocurrency; Volatility; Prediction; Google search volume;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C22 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes
    • C43 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics - - - Index Numbers and Aggregation
    • C53 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Forecasting and Prediction Models; Simulation Methods

    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:finana:v:63:y:2019:i:c:p:147-159. 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/620166 .

    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.