IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cwl/cwldpp/1406.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Beauty Contests, Bubbles and Iterated Expectations in Asset Markets

Author

Listed:

Abstract

In a financial market where traders are risk averse and short lived, and prices are noisy, asset prices today depend on the average expectation today of tomorrow's price. Thus (iterating this relationship) the date 1 price equals the date 1 average expectation of the date 2 average expectation of the date 3 price. This will not in general equal the date 1 average expectation of the date 3 price. We show how this failure of the law of iterated expectations for average belief can help understand the role of higher order beliefs in a fully rational asset pricing model and explain over-reaction to (noisy) public information.

Suggested Citation

  • Franklin Allen & Stephen Morris & Hyun Song Shin, 2003. "Beauty Contests, Bubbles and Iterated Expectations in Asset Markets," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 1406, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    • Handle: RePEc:cwl:cwldpp:1406
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cowles.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/pub/d14/d1406.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dow, James & Gorton, Gary, 1994. "Arbitrage Chains," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(3), pages 819-849, July.
    2. Dilip Abreu & Markus K. Brunnermeier, 2003. "Bubbles and Crashes," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(1), pages 173-204, January.
    3. Allen F. & Morris S. & Postlewaite A., 1993. "Finite Bubbles with Short Sale Constraints and Asymmetric Information," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 61(2), pages 206-229, December.
    4. Brunnermeier, Markus K., 2001. "Asset Pricing under Asymmetric Information: Bubbles, Crashes, Technical Analysis, and Herding," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198296980.
    5. Townsend, Robert M, 1978. "Market Anticipations, Rational Expectations, and Bayesian Analysis," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 19(2), pages 481-494, June.
    6. Philippe Bacchetta & Eric Van Wincoop, 2006. "Can Information Heterogeneity Explain the Exchange Rate Determination Puzzle?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(3), pages 552-576, June.
    7. Tirole, Jean, 1982. "On the Possibility of Speculation under Rational Expectations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(5), pages 1163-1181, September.
    8. Lucas, Robert E, Jr, 1973. "Some International Evidence on Output-Inflation Tradeoffs," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 63(3), pages 326-334, June.
    9. De Long, J Bradford, et al, 1990. "Positive Feedback Investment Strategies and Destabilizing Rational Speculation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 45(2), pages 379-395, June.
    10. Morris, Stephen & Postlewaite, Andrew & Shin, Hyun Song, 1995. "Depth of Knowledge and the Effect of Higher Order Uncertainty," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 6(3), pages 453-467, November.
    11. Diamond, Douglas W. & Verrecchia, Robert E., 1981. "Information aggregation in a noisy rational expectations economy," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 221-235, September.
    12. Froot, Kenneth A & Scharftstein, David S & Stein, Jeremy C, 1992. "Herd on the Street: Informational Inefficiencies in a Market with Short-Term Speculation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 47(4), pages 1461-1484, September.
    13. Bruno Biais & Peter Bossaerts, 1998. "Asset Prices and Trading Volume in a Beauty Contest," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 65(2), pages 307-340.
    14. He, Hua & Wang, Jiang, 1995. "Differential Information and Dynamic Behavior of Stock Trading Volume," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 8(4), pages 919-972.
    15. Hellwig, Martin F., 1980. "On the aggregation of information in competitive markets," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 22(3), pages 477-498, June.
    16. Ausubel, Lawrence M., 1990. "Partially-revealing rational expectations equilibrium in a competitive economy," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 93-126, February.
    17. Christian Hellwig, 2002. "Public Announcements, Adjustment Delays, and the Business Cycle (November 2002)," UCLA Economics Online Papers 208, UCLA Department of Economics.
    18. Harrison, J. Michael & Kreps, David M., 1979. "Martingales and arbitrage in multiperiod securities markets," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 381-408, June.
    19. Michael Woodford, 2001. "Imperfect Common Knowledge and the Effects of Monetary Policy," NBER Working Papers 8673, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Lucas, Robert Jr., 1972. "Expectations and the neutrality of money," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 4(2), pages 103-124, April.
    21. Franklin Allen & Stephen Morris & Andrew Postlewaite, "undated". "Finite Bubbles with Short Sale Constraints and Asymmetric Information (Reprint 042)," Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research Working Papers 16-92, Wharton School Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research.
    22. Wang, Jiang, 1994. "A Model of Competitive Stock Trading Volume," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 102(1), pages 127-168, February.
    23. Samet, Dov, 1998. "Iterated Expectations and Common Priors," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 24(1-2), pages 131-141, July.
    24. Stephen Morris & Hyun Song Shin, 2002. "Social Value of Public Information," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1521-1534, December.
    25. Joseph G. Pearlman & Thomas J. Sargent, 2005. "Knowing the Forecasts of Others," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 8(2), pages 480-497, April.
    26. Townsend, Robert M, 1983. "Forecasting the Forecasts of Others," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 91(4), pages 546-588, August.
    27. Franklin Allen & Gary Gorton, 1993. "Churning Bubbles," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 60(4), pages 813-836.
    28. J. Michael Harrison & David M. Kreps, 1978. "Speculative Investor Behavior in a Stock Market with Heterogeneous Expectations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 92(2), pages 323-336.
    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. Franklin Allen & Stephen Morris & Hyun Song Shin, 2003. "Beauty Contests, Bubbles and Iterated Expectations in Asset Markets Capital Adequacy Regulation: In Search of a Rationale," Center for Financial Institutions Working Papers 03-06, Wharton School Center for Financial Institutions, University of Pennsylvania.
    2. Angeletos, G.-M. & Lian, C., 2016. "Incomplete Information in Macroeconomics," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1065-1240, Elsevier.
    3. Philippe Bacchetta & Eric Van Wincoop, 2006. "Can Information Heterogeneity Explain the Exchange Rate Determination Puzzle?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(3), pages 552-576, June.
    4. Philippe Bacchetta & Eric Van Wincoop, 2008. "Higher Order Expectations in Asset Pricing," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 40(5), pages 837-866, August.
    5. George-Marios Angeletos & Chen Lian, 2016. "Incomplete Information in Macroeconomics: Accommodating Frictions in Coordination," NBER Working Papers 22297, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Kurz, Mordecai, 2008. "Beauty contests under private information and diverse beliefs: How different?," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(7-8), pages 762-784, July.
    7. Brunnermeier, Markus K. & Oehmke, Martin, 2013. "Bubbles, Financial Crises, and Systemic Risk," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1221-1288, Elsevier.
    8. Kondor, Péter, 2011. "The more we know on the fundamental, the less we agree on the price," CEPR Discussion Papers 8455, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    9. Mordecai Kurz, 2007. "Rational Diverse Beliefs and Economic Volatility," Discussion Papers 06-045, Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research.
    10. John Conlon, 2005. "Should Central Banks Burst Bubbles?," Game Theory and Information 0508007, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. John R. Conlon, 2015. "Should Central Banks Burst Bubbles? Some Microeconomic Issues," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 125(582), pages 141-161, February.
    12. Walker, Todd B., 2007. "How equilibrium prices reveal information in a time series model with disparately informed, competitive traders," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 137(1), pages 512-537, November.
    13. Hyun Song Shin & Jeffery D. Amato, 2003. "Public and private information in monetary policy models," BIS Working Papers 138, Bank for International Settlements.
    14. Hirota, Shinichi & Sunder, Shyam, 2007. "Price bubbles sans dividend anchors: Evidence from laboratory stock markets," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 1875-1909, June.
    15. R. Andergassen, 2003. "Rational destabilising speculation and the riding of bubbles," Working Papers 475, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    16. Makarov, Igor & Rytchkov, Oleg, 2012. "Forecasting the forecasts of others: Implications for asset pricing," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 147(3), pages 941-966.
    17. Kenneth Kasa & Todd B. Walker & Charles H. Whiteman, 2014. "Heterogeneous Beliefs and Tests of Present Value Models," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 81(3), pages 1137-1163.
    18. Amil Dasgupta & Andrea Prat, 2005. "Reputation and Asset Prices: A Theory of Information Cascades and Systematic Mispricing," Levine's Bibliography 784828000000000368, UCLA Department of Economics.
    19. Hirota, Shinichi & Sunder, Shyam, 2007. "Price bubbles sans dividend anchors: Evidence from laboratory stock markets," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 1875-1909, June.
    20. Enders, Zeno & Hakenes, Hendrik Hakenes, 2014. "On the Existence and Prevention of Speculative Bubbles," Working Papers 0567, University of Heidelberg, Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Beauty Contests; Bubbles and iterated expectations in Asset Markets;

    JEL classification:

    • E4 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:cwl:cwldpp:1406. 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: Brittany Ladd (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cowleus.html .

    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.