IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/frz/wpaper/wp2025_13.rdf.html

How Large is Excess Volatility of the EUR/USD Exchange Rate? Evidence from a GAS Approach

Author

Listed:
  • Leonardo Bargigli

Abstract

Using a novel Generalized Autoregressive Score (GAS) methodology applied to EUR/USD high-frequency interdealer data on price variations and net demand in 2016, this paper provides evidence of a substantial violation of market efficiency in the foreign exchange market. The analysis shows that endogenous factors amplified efficient price fluctuations by at least 46\% on average, underscoring the importance of informational asymmetry and feedback trading in exchange rate dynamics. The key implication is that excess volatility of the EUR/USD exchange rate is not only sizeable but also structural, as it arises from mechanisms intrinsic to market functioning.

Suggested Citation

  • Leonardo Bargigli, 2025. "How Large is Excess Volatility of the EUR/USD Exchange Rate? Evidence from a GAS Approach," Working Papers - Economics wp2025_13.rdf, Universita' degli Studi di Firenze, Dipartimento di Scienze per l'Economia e l'Impresa.
    • Handle: RePEc:frz:wpaper:wp2025_13.rdf
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.disei.unifi.it/upload/sub/pubblicazioni/repec/pdf/wp13_2025.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robert J. Shiller, 2015. "Irrational Exuberance," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 3, number 10421, December.
    2. Hasbrouck, Joel, 1991. "Measuring the Information Content of Stock Trades," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(1), pages 179-207, March.
    3. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:2:p:755-793 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Liu, Christina Y & He, Jia, 1991. "A Variance-Ratio Test of Random Walks in Foreign Exchange Rates," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(2), pages 773-785, June.
    5. Djeutem, Edouard & Kasa, Kenneth, 2013. "Robustness and exchange rate volatility," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(1), pages 27-39.
    6. Torben G. Andersen & Tim Bollerslev & Francis X. Diebold, 2007. "Roughing It Up: Including Jump Components in the Measurement, Modeling, and Forecasting of Return Volatility," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(4), pages 701-720, November.
    7. Fama, Eugene F, 1976. "Efficient Capital Markets: Reply," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 31(1), pages 143-145, March.
    8. Jean-Philippe Bouchaud, 2021. "The Inelastic Market Hypothesis: A Microstructural Interpretation," Papers 2108.00242, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2022.
    9. King, Michael R. & Osler, Carol L. & Rime, Dagfinn, 2013. "The market microstructure approach to foreign exchange: Looking back and looking forward," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 95-119.
    10. Charlie X. Cai & Qi Zhang, 2016. "High†Frequency Exchange Rate Forecasting," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 22(1), pages 120-141, January.
    11. Jonathan Brogaard & Terrence Hendershott & Ryan Riordan, 2014. "High-Frequency Trading and Price Discovery," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 27(8), pages 2267-2306.
    12. Sentana, Enrique & Fiorentini, Gabriele, 2001. "Identification, estimation and testing of conditionally heteroskedastic factor models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 102(2), pages 143-164, June.
    13. Osler, Carol & Savaser, Tanseli, 2011. "Extreme returns: The case of currencies," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 2868-2880, November.
    14. Menkveld, Albert J. & Koopman, Siem Jan & Lucas, Andre, 2007. "Modeling Around-the-Clock Price Discovery for Cross-Listed Stocks Using State Space Methods," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 25, pages 213-225, April.
    15. Clifford S. Asness & Tobias J. Moskowitz & Lasse Heje Pedersen, 2013. "Value and Momentum Everywhere," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 68(3), pages 929-985, June.
    16. Rothenberg, Thomas J, 1971. "Identification in Parametric Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 39(3), pages 577-591, May.
    17. Cochrane, John H., 1991. "Volatility tests and efficient markets : A review essay," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 463-485, June.
    18. Christopher J. Neely, 2011. "A survey of announcement effects on foreign exchange volatility and jumps," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 93(Sep), pages 361-385.
    19. Jean-Philippe Bouchaud, 2022. "The inelastic market hypothesis: a microstructural interpretation," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(10), pages 1785-1795, October.
    20. Enzo Weber, 2010. "Structural Conditional Correlation," Journal of Financial Econometrics, Oxford University Press, vol. 8(3), pages 392-407, Summer.
    21. Cuthbertson, Keith & Hyde, Stuart, 2002. "Excess volatility and efficiency in French and German stock markets," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 19(3), pages 399-418, May.
    22. Francis X. Diebold & Kamil Yılmaz, 2007. "Macroeconomic Volatility and Stock Market Volatility,World-Wide," Koç University-TUSIAD Economic Research Forum Working Papers 0711, Koc University-TUSIAD Economic Research Forum.
    23. Marco Del Negro & Giorgio E. Primiceri, 2015. "Time Varying Structural Vector Autoregressions and Monetary Policy: A Corrigendum," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 82(4), pages 1342-1345.
    24. Suzanne S. Lee & Per A. Mykland, 2008. "Jumps in Financial Markets: A New Nonparametric Test and Jump Dynamics," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 21(6), pages 2535-2563, November.
    25. Roberto Rigobon, 2003. "Identification Through Heteroskedasticity," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 85(4), pages 777-792, November.
    26. Milunovich George & Yang Minxian, 2013. "On Identifying Structural VAR Models via ARCH Effects," Journal of Time Series Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 5(2), pages 117-131, May.
    27. N. Gregory Mankiw & David Romer & Matthew D. Shapiro, 1991. "Stock Market Forecastability and Volatility: A Statistical Appraisal," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 58(3), pages 455-477.
    28. Roll, Richard, 1984. "Orange Juice and Weather," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(5), pages 861-880, December.
    29. Andrew W. Lo, A. Craig MacKinlay, 1988. "Stock Market Prices do not Follow Random Walks: Evidence from a Simple Specification Test," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 1(1), pages 41-66.
    30. Narasimhan Jegadeesh & Sheridan Titman, 2001. "Profitability of Momentum Strategies: An Evaluation of Alternative Explanations," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(2), pages 699-720, April.
    31. Ranaldo, Angelo & Somogyi, Fabricius, 2021. "Asymmetric information risk in FX markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(2), pages 391-411.
    32. Aslanidis, Nektarios & Casas, Isabel, 2013. "Nonparametric correlation models for portfolio allocation," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(7), pages 2268-2283.
    33. Martin D.D. Evans & Richard K. Lyons, 2017. "Order Flow and Exchange Rate Dynamics," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Studies in Foreign Exchange Economics, chapter 6, pages 247-290, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    34. Torben G. Andersen & Tim Bollerslev & Francis X. Diebold & Clara Vega, 2003. "Micro Effects of Macro Announcements: Real-Time Price Discovery in Foreign Exchange," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 38-62, March.
    35. Herwartz, Helmut & Lange, Alexander & Maxand, Simone, 2019. "Statistical identification in SVARs - Monte Carlo experiments and a comparative assessment of the role of economic uncertainties for the US business cycle," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 375, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    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. Ledenyov, Dimitri O. & Ledenyov, Viktor O., 2015. "Wave function method to forecast foreign currencies exchange rates at ultra high frequency electronic trading in foreign currencies exchange markets," MPRA Paper 67470, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Numan Ülkü & Enzo Weber, 2014. "Identifying the Interaction between Foreign Investor Flows and Emerging Stock Market Returns," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 18(4), pages 1541-1581.
    3. Serdengeçti, Süleyman & Sensoy, Ahmet & Nguyen, Duc Khuong, 2021. "Dynamics of return and liquidity (co) jumps in emerging foreign exchange markets," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    4. Ülkü, Numan & Weber, Enzo, 2013. "Identifying the interaction between stock market returns and trading flows of investor types: Looking into the day using daily data," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 2733-2749.
    5. Lütkepohl, Helmut & Netšunajev, Aleksei, 2015. "Structural vector autoregressions with heteroskedasticity: A comparison of different volatility models," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2015-015, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    6. Corsetti, Giancarlo & Lafarguette, Romain & Mehl, Arnaud, 2019. "Fast trading and the virtue of entropy: evidence from the foreign exchange market," Working Paper Series 2300, European Central Bank.
    7. Fengler, Matthias & Polivka, Jeanine, 2022. "Identifying Structural Shocks to Volatility through a Proxy-MGARCH Model," VfS Annual Conference 2022 (Basel): Big Data in Economics 264010, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    8. Breedon, Francis & Chen, Louisa & Ranaldo, Angelo & Vause, Nicholas, 2023. "Judgment day: Algorithmic trading around the Swiss franc cap removal," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    9. Lütkepohl, Helmut & Netšunajev, Aleksei, 2017. "Structural vector autoregressions with heteroskedasticity: A review of different volatility models," Econometrics and Statistics, Elsevier, vol. 1(C), pages 2-18.
    10. H. Henry Cao & Martin D. D. Evans & Richard K. Lyons, 2017. "Inventory Information," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Studies in Foreign Exchange Economics, chapter 9, pages 363-413, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    11. Dominik Bertsche & Robin Braun, 2022. "Identification of Structural Vector Autoregressions by Stochastic Volatility," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 40(1), pages 328-341, January.
    12. repec:hum:wpaper:sfb649dp2015-015 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Hussain, Syed Mujahid & Ahmad, Nisar & Ahmed, Sheraz, 2023. "Applications of high-frequency data in finance: A bibliometric literature review," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    14. Wu, Zhen-Xing & Gau, Yin-Feng, 2022. "Informativeness of trades around macroeconomic announcements in the foreign exchange market," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 78(C).
    15. Chaboud, Alain P. & Chiquoine, Benjamin & Hjalmarsson, Erik & Loretan, Mico, 2010. "Frequency of observation and the estimation of integrated volatility in deep and liquid financial markets," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 17(2), pages 212-240, March.
    16. Chan, Kam Fong & Powell, John G. & Treepongkaruna, Sirimon, 2014. "Currency jumps and crises: Do developed and emerging market currencies jump together?," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 132-157.
    17. Makoto Takahashi, 2025. "Returns and Order Flow Imbalances: Intraday Dynamics and Macroeconomic News Effects," Papers 2508.06788, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2025.
    18. Dungey, Mardi & Matei, Marius & Treepongkaruna, Sirimon, 2020. "Examining stress in Asian currencies: A perspective offered by high frequency financial market data," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    19. Filippou, Ilias & Maurer, Thomas A. & Pezzo, Luca & Taylor, Mark P., 2024. "Importance of transaction costs for asset allocation in foreign exchange markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 159(C).
    20. Deniz Erdemlioglu & Nikola Gradojevic, 2021. "Heterogeneous investment horizons, risk regimes, and realized jumps," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(1), pages 617-643, January.
    21. Helmut Lütkepohl & Thore Schlaak, 2018. "Choosing Between Different Time‐Varying Volatility Models for Structural Vector Autoregressive Analysis," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 80(4), pages 715-735, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • C32 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes; State Space Models
    • C58 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Financial Econometrics
    • F31 - International Economics - - International Finance - - - Foreign Exchange

    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:frz:wpaper:wp2025_13.rdf. 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: Giorgio Ricchiuti (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/defirit.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.