IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/glofin/v65y2025ics1044028325000377.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Comovement and S&P 500 membership

Author

Listed:
  • DeCoste, Joseph

Abstract

This paper tests the existence of excessive comovement among firms in the S&P 500. Using a fuzzy regression discontinuity approach I show that membership in the S&P 500 leads to significant positive excess comovement in the long term. I evaluate a traditional, liquidity based explanation and a friction based explanation, and find no evidence that liquidity is driving excess comovement in the sample. I show that the previous lack of evidence for excess comovement shown in Chen, Singal, Whitelaw (2016) is due to heterogeneous effects on firms who are newly included versus those that are established members. One potential explanation is that immediately after inclusion, investors take time to rebalance and fully integrate the new stock into the group, reducing observed increases in comovement in the short term. These results constitute new evidence of frictions when exposed to large classes of noise traders with correlated demands, such as those populating the S&P 500.

Suggested Citation

  • DeCoste, Joseph, 2025. "Comovement and S&P 500 membership," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:glofin:v:65:y:2025:i:c:s1044028325000377
    DOI: 10.1016/j.gfj.2025.101110
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1044028325000377
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.gfj.2025.101110?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

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ben S. Bernanke & Kenneth N. Kuttner, 2005. "What Explains the Stock Market's Reaction to Federal Reserve Policy?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(3), pages 1221-1257, June.
    2. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:4:p:1901-1930 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Robert S. Pindyck & Julio J. Rotemberg, 1993. "The Comovement of Stock Prices," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(4), pages 1073-1104.
    4. Liao, Yixin & Coakley, Jerry & Kellard, Neil, 2022. "Index tracking and beta arbitrage effects in comovement," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    5. Anand M. Vijh & Jiawei (Brooke) Wang, 2022. "Negative returns on addition to the S&P 500 index and positive returns on deletion? New evidence on the attractiveness of S&P 500 versus S&P 400 indexes," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 51(4), pages 1127-1164, December.
    6. Jonathan Brogaard & Matthew C Ringgenberg & David Sovich, 2019. "The Economic Impact of Index Investing," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(9), pages 3461-3499.
    7. Petajisto, Antti, 2011. "The index premium and its hidden cost for index funds," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 271-288, March.
    8. Vicente Cuñat & Mireia Gine & Maria Guadalupe, 2012. "The Vote Is Cast: The Effect of Corporate Governance on Shareholder Value," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(5), pages 1943-1977, October.
    9. Stephanie Riegg Cellini & Fernando Ferreira & Jesse Rothstein, 2010. "The Value of School Facility Investments: Evidence from a Dynamic Regression Discontinuity Design," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 125(1), pages 215-261.
    10. Ian R Appel & Todd A Gormley & Donald B Keim, 2019. "Standing on the Shoulders of Giants: The Effect of Passive Investors on Activism," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(7), pages 2720-2774.
    11. Alan D. Crane & Sébastien Michenaud & James P. Weston, 2016. "Editor's Choice The Effect of Institutional Ownership on Payout Policy: Evidence from Index Thresholds," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 29(6), pages 1377-1408.
    12. Dimitri Vayanos & Paul Woolley, 2013. "An Institutional Theory of Momentum and Reversal," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(5), pages 1087-1145.
    13. James D. Hamilton, 2009. "Causes and Consequences of the Oil Shock of 2007-08," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 40(1 (Spring), pages 215-283.
    14. Pindyck, Robert S & Rotemberg, Julio J, 1990. "The Excess Co-movement of Commodity Prices," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 100(403), pages 1173-1189, December.
    15. Harris, Lawrence E & Gurel, Eitan, 1986. "Price and Volume Effects Associated with Changes in the S&P 500 List: New Evidence for the Existence of Price Pressures," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 41(4), pages 815-829, September.
    16. Andrew Gelman & Guido Imbens, 2019. "Why High-Order Polynomials Should Not Be Used in Regression Discontinuity Designs," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(3), pages 447-456, July.
    17. Ke Tang & Wei Xiong, 2012. "Index Investment and the Financialization of Commodities," Financial Analysts Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 68(6), pages 54-74, November.
    18. Daniel Jubinski & Marc Tomljanovich, 2013. "Do FOMC minutes matter to markets? An intraday analysis of FOMC minutes releases on individual equity volatility and returns," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 22(3), pages 86-97, September.
    19. Itzhak Ben‐David & Francesco Franzoni & Rabih Moussawi, 2018. "Do ETFs Increase Volatility?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 73(6), pages 2471-2535, December.
    20. Zhi Da & Sophie Shive, 2018. "Exchange traded funds and asset return correlations," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 24(1), pages 136-168, January.
    21. Amihud, Yakov, 2002. "Illiquidity and stock returns: cross-section and time-series effects," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 31-56, January.
    22. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 2015. "A five-factor asset pricing model," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 1-22.
    23. Aditya Kaul & Vikas Mehrotra & Randall Morck, 2000. "Demand Curves for Stocks Do Slope Down: New Evidence from an Index Weights Adjustment," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(2), pages 893-912, April.
    24. Stijn Claessens & Yishay Yafeh, 2013. "Comovement of Newly Added Stocks with National Market Indices: Evidence from Around the World," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 17(1), pages 203-227.
    25. Fich, Eliezer M. & Harford, Jarrad & Tran, Anh L., 2015. "Motivated monitors: The importance of institutional investors׳ portfolio weights," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(1), pages 21-48.
    26. Dimson, Elroy, 1979. "Risk measurement when shares are subject to infrequent trading," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 197-226, June.
    27. Jerry Coakley & George Dotsis & Apostolos Kourtis & Dimitris Psychoyios, 2024. "The S&P 500 index inclusion effect: Evidence from the options market," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(1), pages 1157-1171, January.
    28. Allan Zebedee & Eric Bentzen & Peter Hansen & Asger Lunde, 2008. "The Greenspan years: an analysis of the magnitude and speed of the equity market response to FOMC announcements," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 22(1), pages 3-20, March.
    29. David C Brown & Shaun William Davies & Matthew C Ringgenberg, 2021. "ETF Arbitrage, Non-Fundamental Demand, and Return Predictability [The equity share in new issues and aggregate stock returns]," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 25(4), pages 937-972.
    30. Lutz Kilian & Daniel P. Murphy, 2014. "The Role Of Inventories And Speculative Trading In The Global Market For Crude Oil," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(3), pages 454-478, April.
    31. Diane K. Denis & John J. McConnell & Alexei V. Ovtchinnikov & Yun Yu, 2003. "S&P 500 Index Additions and Earnings Expectations," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(5), pages 1821-1840, October.
    32. Alex Edmans & Itay Goldstein & Wei Jiang, 2012. "The Real Effects of Financial Markets: The Impact of Prices on Takeovers," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(3), pages 933-971, June.
    33. Shleifer, Andrei, 1986. "Do Demand Curves for Stocks Slope Down?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 41(3), pages 579-590, July.
    34. Yen-Cheng Chang & Harrison Hong & Inessa Liskovich, 2015. "Regression Discontinuity and the Price Effects of Stock Market Indexing," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(1), pages 212-246.
    35. Suleyman Basak & Anna Pavlova, 2013. "Asset Prices and Institutional Investors," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(5), pages 1728-1758, August.
    36. Buffa, Andrea M. & Hodor, Idan, 2023. "Institutional investors, heterogeneous benchmarks and the comovement of asset prices," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(2), pages 352-381.
    37. Froot, Kenneth A. & Dabora, Emil M., 1999. "How are stock prices affected by the location of trade?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 189-216, August.
    38. Robin Greenwood, 2008. "Excess Comovement of Stock Returns: Evidence from Cross-Sectional Variation in Nikkei 225 Weights," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 21(3), pages 1153-1186, May.
    39. David S. Lee & Thomas Lemieux, 2010. "Regression Discontinuity Designs in Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(2), pages 281-355, June.
    40. Itay Goldstein & Liyan Yang, 2022. "Commodity Financialization and Information Transmission," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 77(5), pages 2613-2667, October.
    41. Dwight R. Sanders & Scott H. Irwin, 2010. "A speculative bubble in commodity futures prices? Cross‐sectional evidence," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 41(1), pages 25-32, January.
    42. Brian J. Henderson & Neil D. Pearson & Li Wang, 2015. "Editor's Choice New Evidence on the Financialization of Commodity Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(5), pages 1285-1311.
    43. Jeffrey Wurgler & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2002. "Does Arbitrage Flatten Demand Curves for Stocks?," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 75(4), pages 583-608, October.
    44. Harford, Jarrad & Kaul, Aditya, 2005. "Correlated Order Flow: Pervasiveness, Sources, and Pricing Effects," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 40(1), pages 29-55, March.
    45. Michael Sockin & Wei Xiong, 2015. "Informational Frictions and Commodity Markets," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(5), pages 2063-2098, October.
    46. Adams, Renée & Almeida, Heitor & Ferreira, Daniel, 2009. "Understanding the relationship between founder-CEOs and firm performance," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 136-150, January.
    47. Robin Greenwood & Marco Sammon, 2025. "The Disappearing Index Effect," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 80(2), pages 657-698, April.
    48. Carhart, Mark M, 1997. "On Persistence in Mutual Fund Performance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 57-82, March.
    49. Jubinski, Daniel & Tomljanovich, Marc, 2013. "Do FOMC minutes matter to markets? An intraday analysis of FOMC minutes releases on individual equity volatility and returns," Review of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(3), pages 86-97.
    50. Travis A. Dyer & Darren T. Roulstone & Andrew Van Buskirk, 2024. "Disclosure Similarity and Future Stock Return Comovement," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 70(7), pages 4762-4780, July.
    51. Benjamin Bennett & René M. Stulz & Zexi Wang, 2020. "Does Joining the S&P 500 Index Hurt Firms?," NBER Working Papers 27593, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    52. Bennett, Benjamin & Stulz, Rene M. & Wang, Zexi, 2020. "Does Joining the S&P 500 Index Hurt Firms?," Working Paper Series 2020-17, Ohio State University, Charles A. Dice Center for Research in Financial Economics.
    53. Boone, Audra L. & White, Joshua T., 2015. "The effect of institutional ownership on firm transparency and information production," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(3), pages 508-533.
    54. Irwin, Scott H. & Sanders, Dwight R., 2012. "Testing the Masters Hypothesis in commodity futures markets," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 256-269.
    55. Ananth Madhavan, 2003. "The Russell Reconstitution Effect," Financial Analysts Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(4), pages 51-64, July.
    56. Olivier Dessaint & Thierry Foucault & Laurent Frésard & Adrien Matray, 2019. "Noisy Stock Prices and Corporate Investment," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 32(7), pages 2625-2672.
    57. Chen, Honghui & Singal, Vijay & Whitelaw, Robert F., 2016. "Comovement revisited," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(3), pages 624-644.
    58. Kenneth J. Singleton, 2014. "Investor Flows and the 2008 Boom/Bust in Oil Prices," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(2), pages 300-318, February.
    59. Chinco, Alex & Sammon, Marco, 2024. "The passive ownership share is double what you think it is," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    60. Appel, Ian R. & Gormley, Todd A. & Keim, Donald B., 2016. "Passive investors, not passive owners," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(1), pages 111-141.
    61. Philip Bond & Alex Edmans & Itay Goldstein, 2012. "The Real Effects of Financial Markets," Annual Review of Financial Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 4(1), pages 339-360, October.
    62. Goyenko, Ruslan Y. & Holden, Craig W. & Trzcinka, Charles A., 2009. "Do liquidity measures measure liquidity?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(2), pages 153-181, May.
    63. Vijh, Anand M, 1994. "S&P 500 Trading Strategies and Stock Betas," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 7(1), pages 215-251.
    64. Tarun Chordia & Amit Goyal & Gil Sadka & Ronnie Sadka & Lakshmanan Shivakumar, 2009. "Liquidity and the Post-Earnings-Announcement Drift," Financial Analysts Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 65(4), pages 18-32, July.
    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. Benjamin Bennett & René M. Stulz & Zexi Wang, 2020. "Does Joining the S&P 500 Index Hurt Firms?," NBER Working Papers 27593, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Dasgupta, Amil & Fos, Vyacheslav & Sautner, Zacharias, 2021. "Institutional investors and corporate governance," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 112114, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    3. Chinco, Alex & Sammon, Marco, 2024. "The passive ownership share is double what you think it is," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    4. Barberis, Nicholas & Shleifer, Andrei & Wurgler, Jeffrey, 2005. "Comovement," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(2), pages 283-317, February.
    5. Escobar,Mariana & Pandolfi,Lorenzo & Pedraza Morales,Alvaro Enrique & Williams,Tomas, 2021. "The Anatomy of Index Rebalancings : Evidence from Transaction Data," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9770, The World Bank.
    6. Jiang, Hao & Vayanos, Dimitri & Zheng, Lu, 2020. "Tracking biased weights: asset pricing implications of value-weighted indexing," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 118847, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    7. Kenechukwu E. Anadu & Mathias S. Kruttli & Patrick E. McCabe & Emilio Osambela & Chaehee Shin, 2018. "The Shift from Active to Passive Investing: Potential Risks to Financial Stability?," Supervisory Research and Analysis Working Papers RPA 18-4, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    8. Schnitzler, Jan, 2018. "S&P 500 inclusions and stock supply," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 341-356.
    9. Anand M. Vijh & Jiawei (Brooke) Wang, 2022. "Negative returns on addition to the S&P 500 index and positive returns on deletion? New evidence on the attractiveness of S&P 500 versus S&P 400 indexes," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 51(4), pages 1127-1164, December.
    10. Bohl, Martin T. & Irwin, Scott H. & Pütz, Alexander & Sulewski, Christoph, 2023. "The impact of financialization on the efficiency of commodity futures markets," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 31(C).
    11. Martijn Cremers & Ankur Pareek & Zacharias Sautner, 2020. "Short-Term Investors, Long-Term Investments, and Firm Value: Evidence from Russell 2000 Index Inclusions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(10), pages 4535-4551, October.
    12. Chattopadhyay, Akash & Shaffer, Matthew D. & Wang, Charles C.Y., 2020. "Governance through shame and aspiration: Index creation and corporate behavior," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(3), pages 704-724.
    13. Liao, Yixin & Coakley, Jerry & Kellard, Neil, 2022. "Index tracking and beta arbitrage effects in comovement," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    14. Duffy, John & Friedman, Dan & Rabanal, Jean Paul & Rud, Olga, 2022. "The impact of ETF index inclusion on stock prices," UiS Working Papers in Economics and Finance 2022/2, University of Stavanger.
    15. Coles, Jeffrey L. & Heath, Davidson & Ringgenberg, Matthew C., 2022. "On index investing," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(3), pages 665-683.
    16. Itzhak Ben-David & Francesco A. Franzoni & Rabih Moussawi, 2019. "An Improved Method to Predict Assignment of Stocks into Russell Indexes," Swiss Finance Institute Research Paper Series 19-56, Swiss Finance Institute.
    17. Schmidt, Cornelius & Fahlenbrach, Rüdiger, 2017. "Do exogenous changes in passive institutional ownership affect corporate governance and firm value?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(2), pages 285-306.
    18. Chen, Tao & Dong, Hui & Lin, Chen, 2020. "Institutional shareholders and corporate social responsibility," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(2), pages 483-504.
    19. Chu, Gang & Goodell, John W. & Li, Xiao & Zhang, Yongjie, 2021. "Long-term impacts of index reconstitutions: Evidence from the CSI 300 additions and deletions," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    20. Charles Cao & Matthew Gustafson & Raisa Velthuis, 2019. "Index Membership and Small Firm Financing," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(9), pages 4156-4178, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G23 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Non-bank Financial Institutions; Financial Instruments; Institutional Investors

    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:65:y:2025:i:c:s1044028325000377. 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.