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Do investors hold that they know? Impact of familiarity bias on investor’s reluctance to realize losses: Experimental approach

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  • Bulipopova, Ekaterina
  • Zhdanov, Vladislav
  • Simonov, Artem

Abstract

In this article we investigate the impact of familiarity bias on the individual investor’s reluctance to realize losses. Our experimental approach reveals a strong correlation between familiarity and disposition effect. We conducted 714 tests in which different respondents could sell stocks of two types – winners and losers. One group of respondents “owned” familiar assets and another group operated anonymous portfolios. The results of the experiment show that an individual investor’s tendency to ride losers too long is more than twice as high in the case of unfamiliar stocks as it is when assets are familiar to the holder.

Suggested Citation

  • Bulipopova, Ekaterina & Zhdanov, Vladislav & Simonov, Artem, 2014. "Do investors hold that they know? Impact of familiarity bias on investor’s reluctance to realize losses: Experimental approach," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 11(4), pages 463-469.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:finlet:v:11:y:2014:i:4:p:463-469
    DOI: 10.1016/j.frl.2014.10.003
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    7. Brad M. Barber & Yi‐Tsung Lee & Yu‐Jane Liu & Terrance Odean, 2007. "Is the Aggregate Investor Reluctant to Realise Losses? Evidence from Taiwan," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 13(3), pages 423-447, June.
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    Cited by:

    1. Vladislav Zhdanov & Artem Simonov, 2021. "Sell Winners and Buy Losers? The Impact of Familiarity on Individual Investors’ Decision-Making: Experimental Results," IJFS, MDPI, vol. 9(3), pages 1-8, September.
    2. Vanessa Martins Valcanover & Igor Bernardi Sonza & Wesley Vieira da Silva, 2020. "Behavioral Finance Experiments: A Recent Systematic Literature Review," SAGE Open, , vol. 10(4), pages 21582440209, November.
    3. Xu, Feng & Wan, Difang, 2015. "The impacts of institutional and individual investors on the price discovery in stock index futures market: Evidence from China," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 15(C), pages 221-231.
    4. Chen, Xiangyu & Tongurai, Jittima, 2023. "Informational linkage and price discovery between China's futures and spot markets: Evidence from the US–China trade dispute," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Behavioral finance; Familiarity bias; Disposition effect; Individual investor; Reluctance to realize losses;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G - Financial Economics
    • G - Financial Economics
    • G - Financial Economics
    • G - Financial Economics

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