IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cpr/ceprdp/16392.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Pricing Ethics in the Foreign Exchange Market: Environmental, Social and Governance Ratings and Currency Premia

Author

Listed:
  • Taylor, Mark
  • Filippou, Ilias

Abstract

We examine the cross-sectional predictive ability of the Refinitiv Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) score for returns in the foreign exchange market, using ESG scores aggregated at the national level, and find that ESG is a strong negative predictor of currency returns. Intuitively, investors require a premium for financing low-ESG countries while high-ESG countries offer lower returns and provide a hedge in the bad state of the world. We show that ESG is priced in the cross-section of currency returns. We also consider the different components of ESG and show that its predictability is driven by the environmental pillar of the ESG ratings. The profitability of the ESG currency strategy is not driven by the carry trade and is robust to transaction costs.

Suggested Citation

  • Taylor, Mark & Filippou, Ilias, 2021. "Pricing Ethics in the Foreign Exchange Market: Environmental, Social and Governance Ratings and Currency Premia," CEPR Discussion Papers 16392, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:16392
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cepr.org/publications/DP16392
    Download Restriction: CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org
    ---><---

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

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Michael J. Sager & Mark P. Taylor, 2006. "Under the microscope: the structure of the foreign exchange market," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 11(1), pages 81-95.
    2. Melvin, Michael & Taylor, Mark P., 2009. "The crisis in the foreign exchange market," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(8), pages 1317-1330, December.
    3. Filippou, Ilias & Taylor, Mark P., 2017. "Common Macro Factors and Currency Premia," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 52(4), pages 1731-1763, August.
    4. Hansen, Lars Peter & Jagannathan, Ravi, 1997. "Assessing Specification Errors in Stochastic Discount Factor Models," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(2), pages 557-590, June.
    5. Craig Burnside & Martin Eichenbaum & Isaac Kleshchelski & Sergio Rebelo, 2011. "Do Peso Problems Explain the Returns to the Carry Trade?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(3), pages 853-891.
    6. Taylor, Mark P, 1989. "Covered Interest Arbitrage and Market Turbulence," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 99(396), pages 376-391, June.
    7. Arno Riedl & Paul Smeets, 2017. "Why Do Investors Hold Socially Responsible Mutual Funds?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(6), pages 2505-2550, December.
    8. Lukas Menkhoff & Lucio Sarno & Maik Schmeling & Andreas Schrimpf, 2012. "Carry Trades and Global Foreign Exchange Volatility," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(2), pages 681-718, April.
    9. Mueller, Philippe & Stathopoulos, Andreas & Vedolin, Andrea, 2017. "International correlation risk," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(2), pages 270-299.
    10. Shanken, Jay, 1992. "On the Estimation of Beta-Pricing Models," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 5(1), pages 1-33.
    11. Hanno Lustig & Nikolai Roussanov & Adrien Verdelhan, 2011. "Common Risk Factors in Currency Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(11), pages 3731-3777.
    12. Akram, Q. Farooq & Rime, Dagfinn & Sarno, Lucio, 2008. "Arbitrage in the foreign exchange market: Turning on the microscope," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(2), pages 237-253, December.
    13. Mueller, Philippe & Stathopoulos, Andreas & Vedolin, Andrea, 2017. "International correlation risk," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 84140, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    14. Rui Albuquerque & Yrjö Koskinen & Chendi Zhang, 2019. "Corporate Social Responsibility and Firm Risk: Theory and Empirical Evidence," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(10), pages 4451-4469, October.
    15. Filippou, Ilias & Gozluklu, Arie E. & Taylor, Mark P., 2018. "Global Political Risk and Currency Momentum," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 53(5), pages 2227-2259, October.
    16. Melvin, Michael & Taylor, Mark P., 2009. "The global financial crisis: Causes, threats and opportunities. Introduction and overview," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(8), pages 1243-1245, December.
    17. Newey, Whitney & West, Kenneth, 2014. "A simple, positive semi-definite, heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation consistent covariance matrix," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 33(1), pages 125-132.
    18. Karl V. Lins & Henri Servaes & Ane Tamayo, 2017. "Social Capital, Trust, and Firm Performance: The Value of Corporate Social Responsibility during the Financial Crisis," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(4), pages 1785-1824, August.
    19. Fama, Eugene F & MacBeth, James D, 1973. "Risk, Return, and Equilibrium: Empirical Tests," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(3), pages 607-636, May-June.
    20. Taylor, Mark & Filippou, Ilias & Rapach, David & Zhou, Guofu, 2020. "Exchange Rate Prediction with Machine Learning and a Smart Carry Trade Portfolio," CEPR Discussion Papers 15305, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    21. Taylor, Mark & Filippou, Ilias & Gozluklu, Arie & Nguyen, My, 2020. "U.S. Populist Rhetoric and Currency Returns," CEPR Discussion Papers 15054, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    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. Bauckloh, Michael Tobias & Dobrick, Juris & Höck, André & Utz, Sebastian & Wagner, Marcus, 2023. ""In partnership for the goals"? The (dis)agreement of SDG ratings," CFR Working Papers 23-02, University of Cologne, Centre for Financial Research (CFR).
    2. Shusen Zhu & Hui Sun & Beibei Zhang & Zedong Yang & Xuechao Xia, 2023. "Bilateral Effects of ESG Responsibility Fulfillment of Industrial Companies on Green Innovation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(13), pages 1-20, June.
    3. Faizul Haque & Collins G. Ntim, 2022. "Do corporate sustainability initiatives improve corporate carbon performance? Evidence from European firms," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(7), pages 3318-3334, November.

    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. Filippou, Ilias & Taylor, Mark P., 2023. "Forward-Looking Policy Rules and Currency Premia," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(1), pages 449-483, February.
    2. Fan, Zhenzhen & Londono, Juan M. & Xiao, Xiao, 2022. "Equity tail risk and currency risk premiums," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(1), pages 484-503.
    3. Eriksen, Jonas N., 2019. "Cross-sectional return dispersion and currency momentum," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 91-108.
    4. Jamali, Ibrahim & Yamani, Ehab & Smallwood, Aaron D., 2023. "An investment-based explanation of currency excess returns," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    5. Banti, Chiara & Phylaktis, Kate & Sarno, Lucio, 2012. "Global liquidity risk in the foreign exchange market," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 267-291.
    6. Colacito, Riccardo & Riddiough, Steven J. & Sarno, Lucio, 2020. "Business cycles and currency returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 137(3), pages 659-678.
    7. Opie, Wei & Riddiough, Steven J., 2020. "Global currency hedging with common risk factors," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(3), pages 780-805.
    8. Kerstin Bernoth & Jürgen von Hagen & Casper G. de Vries, 2020. "Currency Futures' Risk Premia and Risk Factors," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1866, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    9. Della Corte, Pasquale & Ramadorai, Tarun & Sarno, Lucio, 2016. "Volatility risk premia and exchange rate predictability," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(1), pages 21-40.
    10. Gurdip Bakshi & Xiaohui Gao & Alberto G. Rossi, 2019. "Understanding the Sources of Risk Underlying the Cross Section of Commodity Returns," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(2), pages 619-641, February.
    11. Byrne, Joseph P. & Ibrahim, Boulis Maher & Sakemoto, Ryuta, 2022. "The time-varying risk price of currency portfolios," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    12. Joseph, Byrne & Sakemoto, Ryuta, 2020. "The Conditional Risk and Return Trade-Off on Currency Portfolios," MPRA Paper 99497, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Byrne, Joseph P. & Sakemoto, Ryuta, 2021. "The conditional volatility premium on currency portfolios," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    14. Aleksejs Krecetovs & Pasquale Della Corte, 2016. "Macro uncertainty and currency premia," 2016 Meeting Papers 624, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    15. Ferdinand Dreher & Johannes Gräb & Thomas Kostka, 2020. "From carry trades to curvy trades," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(3), pages 758-780, March.
    16. Byrne, Joseph P. & Ibrahim, Boulis Maher & Sakemoto, Ryuta, 2018. "Common information in carry trade risk factors," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 37-47.
    17. Nucera, Federico, 2017. "Unemployment fluctuations and the predictability of currency returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 88-106.
    18. Atanasov, Victoria & Nitschka, Thomas, 2014. "Currency excess returns and global downside market risk," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 268-285.
    19. Gino Cenedese & Richard Payne & Lucio Sarno & Giorgio Valente, 2016. "What Do Stock Markets Tell Us about Exchange Rates?," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 20(3), pages 1045-1080.
    20. Cheong, Calvin W.H. & Sinnakkannu, Jothee & Ramasamy, Sockalingam, 2017. "On the predictability of carry trade returns: The case of the Chinese Yuan," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 39(PA), pages 358-376.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Environmental; Social; Governance; Refinitiv; ESG; Foreign exchange market; risk premium;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F31 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - Foreign Exchange
    • 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
    • G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Financial Risk and Risk Management; Capital and Ownership Structure; Value of Firms; Goodwill

    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:cpr:ceprdp:16392. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cepr.org .

    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.