IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/22890.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Climate Risks and Market Efficiency

Author

Listed:
  • Harrison Hong
  • Frank Weikai Li
  • Jiangmin Xu

Abstract

We investigate whether stock markets efficiently price risks brought on or exacerbated by climate change. We focus on drought, the most damaging natural disaster for crops and food-company cash flows. We show that prolonged drought in a country, measured by the Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) from climate studies, forecasts both declines in profitability ratios and poor stock returns for food companies in that country. A portfolio short food stocks of countries in drought and long those of countries not in drought generates a 9.2% annualized return from 1985 to 2015. This excess predictability is larger in countries having little history of droughts prior to the 1980s. Our findings support regulatory concerns of markets inexperienced with climate change underreacting to such risks.

Suggested Citation

  • Harrison Hong & Frank Weikai Li & Jiangmin Xu, 2016. "Climate Risks and Market Efficiency," NBER Working Papers 22890, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:22890
    Note: AP
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w22890.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hong, Harrison & Torous, Walter & Valkanov, Rossen, 2007. "Do industries lead stock markets?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(2), pages 367-396, February.
    2. Montgomery, W. David, 1972. "Markets in licenses and efficient pollution control programs," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 5(3), pages 395-418, December.
    3. Ľuboš Pástor & Robert F. Stambaugh & Lucian A. Taylor, 2017. "Do Funds Make More When They Trade More?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(4), pages 1483-1528, August.
    4. Zivot, Eric & Andrews, Donald W K, 2002. "Further Evidence on the Great Crash, the Oil-Price Shock, and the Unit-Root Hypothesis," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 20(1), pages 25-44, January.
    5. Malcolm Baker & Jeffrey Wurgler, 2000. "The Equity Share in New Issues and Aggregate Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(5), pages 2219-2257, October.
    6. Corey Lesk & Pedram Rowhani & Navin Ramankutty, 2016. "Influence of extreme weather disasters on global crop production," Nature, Nature, vol. 529(7584), pages 84-87, January.
    7. Sean D. Campbell & Francis X. Diebold, 2005. "Weather Forecasting for Weather Derivatives," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 100, pages 6-16, March.
    8. Campbell, John Y. & Yogo, Motohiro, 2006. "Efficient tests of stock return predictability," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 27-60, July.
    9. John Y. Campbell, Robert J. Shiller, 1988. "The Dividend-Price Ratio and Expectations of Future Dividends and Discount Factors," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 1(3), pages 195-228.
    10. Mendelsohn, Robert & Nordhaus, William D & Shaw, Daigee, 1994. "The Impact of Global Warming on Agriculture: A Ricardian Analysis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(4), pages 753-771, September.
    11. Roll, Richard, 1984. "Orange Juice and Weather," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(5), pages 861-880, December.
    12. Hirshleifer, David & Teoh, Siew Hong, 2003. "Limited attention, information disclosure, and financial reporting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(1-3), pages 337-386, December.
    13. Tobias J. Moskowitz & Mark Grinblatt, 1999. "Do Industries Explain Momentum?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 54(4), pages 1249-1290, August.
    14. David McLean, R. & Pontiff, Jeffrey & Watanabe, Akiko, 2009. "Share issuance and cross-sectional returns: International evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(1), pages 1-17, October.
    15. Stefano Giglio & Matteo Maggiori & Krishna Rao & Johannes Stroebel & Andreas Weber & Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh, 2021. "Climate Change and Long-Run Discount Rates: Evidence from Real Estate [Abrupt climate change]," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 34(8), pages 3527-3571.
    16. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 2015. "A five-factor asset pricing model," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 1-22.
    17. Lauren Cohen & Andrea Frazzini, 2008. "Economic Links and Predictable Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(4), pages 1977-2011, August.
    18. Kent D. Daniel & Robert B. Litterman & Gernot Wagner, 2016. "Applying Asset Pricing Theory to Calibrate the Price of Climate Risk," NBER Working Papers 22795, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. John M. Griffin & Patrick J. Kelly & Federico Nardari, 2010. "Do Market Efficiency Measures Yield Correct Inferences? A Comparison of Developed and Emerging Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 23(8), pages 3225-3277, August.
    20. Peter Klibanoff & Owen Lamont & Thierry A. Wizman, 1998. "Investor Reaction to Salient News in Closed-End Country Funds," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(2), pages 673-699, April.
    21. Valkanov, Rossen, 2003. "Long-horizon regressions: theoretical results and applications," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(2), pages 201-232, May.
    22. Poterba, James M. & Summers, Lawrence H., 1988. "Mean reversion in stock prices : Evidence and Implications," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 27-59, October.
    23. Kevin E. Trenberth & Aiguo Dai & Gerard van der Schrier & Philip D. Jones & Jonathan Barichivich & Keith R. Briffa & Justin Sheffield, 2014. "Global warming and changes in drought," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 4(1), pages 17-22, January.
    24. Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Titman, Sheridan, 1993. "Returns to Buying Winners and Selling Losers: Implications for Stock Market Efficiency," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(1), pages 65-91, March.
    25. Stern,Nicholas, 2007. "The Economics of Climate Change," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521700801.
    26. Ravi Bansal & Marcelo Ochoa & Dana Kiku, 2016. "Climate Change and Growth Risks," NBER Working Papers 23009, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    27. Mitchell A. Petersen, 2009. "Estimating Standard Errors in Finance Panel Data Sets: Comparing Approaches," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(1), pages 435-480, January.
    28. Fama, Eugene F. & Schwert, G. William, 1977. "Asset returns and inflation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(2), pages 115-146, November.
    29. Carhart, Mark M, 1997. "On Persistence in Mutual Fund Performance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 57-82, March.
    30. French, Kenneth R. & Schwert, G. William & Stambaugh, Robert F., 1987. "Expected stock returns and volatility," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(1), pages 3-29, September.
    31. Kewei Hou & G. Andrew Karolyi & Bong-Chan Kho, 2011. "What Factors Drive Global Stock Returns?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(8), pages 2527-2574.
    32. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1989. "Business conditions and expected returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 23-49, November.
    33. William F. Sharpe, 1964. "Capital Asset Prices: A Theory Of Market Equilibrium Under Conditions Of Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 19(3), pages 425-442, September.
    34. Ozgur S. Ince & R. Burt Porter, 2006. "Individual Equity Return Data From Thomson Datastream: Handle With Care!," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 29(4), pages 463-479, December.
    35. Stefano DellaVigna & Joshua M. Pollet, 2007. "Demographics and Industry Returns," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(5), pages 1667-1702, December.
    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. Stefano Giglio & Bryan Kelly & Johannes Stroebel, 2021. "Climate Finance," Annual Review of Financial Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 13(1), pages 15-36, November.
    2. Finnegan, Stephen & Sharples, Steve & Johnston, Tom & Fulton, Matt, 2018. "The carbon impact of a UK safari park – Application of the GHG protocol using measured energy data," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 256-264.
    3. Torsten Ehlers & Frank Packer, 2017. "Green bond finance and certification," BIS Quarterly Review, Bank for International Settlements, September.
    4. Gallic, Ewen & Vermandel, Gauthier, 2017. "Weather Shocks, Climate Change and Business Cycles," MPRA Paper 81230, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Mukanjari, Samson & Sterner, Thomas, 2018. "Do Markets Trump Politics? Evidence from Fossil Market Reactions to the Paris Agreement and the U.S. Election," Working Papers in Economics 728, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    6. Davide Benedetti & Enrico Biffis & Fotis Chatzimichalakis & Luciano Lilloy Fedele & Ian Simm, 2021. "Climate change investment risk: optimal portfolio construction ahead of the transition to a lower-carbon economy," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 299(1), pages 847-871, April.
    7. Liu, Chao & Akintayo, Adedotun & Jiang, Zhanhong & Henze, Gregor P. & Sarkar, Soumik, 2018. "Multivariate exploration of non-intrusive load monitoring via spatiotemporal pattern network," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 211(C), pages 1106-1122.
    8. Dirk Schoenmaker & Willem Schramade, 2019. "Investing for long-term value creation," Journal of Sustainable Finance & Investment, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 9(4), pages 356-377, October.
    9. Martijn Boermans & Rients Galema, 2017. "Pension funds carbon footprint and investment trade-offs," DNB Working Papers 554, Netherlands Central Bank, Research Department.
    10. Deng, Gary & Newton, Peter, 2017. "Assessing the impact of solar PV on domestic electricity consumption: Exploring the prospect of rebound effects," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 313-324.
    11. Lööf, Hans & Martinsson, Gustav & Mohammadi, Ali, 2017. "Finance and Innovative Investment in Environmental Technology: The Case of Sweden," Working Paper Series in Economics and Institutions of Innovation 445, Royal Institute of Technology, CESIS - Centre of Excellence for Science and Innovation Studies.
    12. Sam Fankhauser, 2017. "Adaptation to Climate Change," Annual Review of Resource Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 9(1), pages 209-230, October.
    13. McKellar, Jennifer M. & Sleep, Sylvia & Bergerson, Joule A. & MacLean, Heather L., 2017. "Expectations and drivers of future greenhouse gas emissions from Canada's oil sands: An expert elicitation," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 162-169.
    14. Boermans, Martijn A. & Galema, Rients, 2019. "Are pension funds actively decarbonizing their portfolios?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 50-60.

    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. Hong, Harrison & Li, Frank Weikai & Xu, Jiangmin, 2019. "Climate risks and market efficiency," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 208(1), pages 265-281.
    2. Cakici, Nusret & Zaremba, Adam, 2022. "Salience theory and the cross-section of stock returns: International and further evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 146(2), pages 689-725.
    3. Linnenluecke, Martina K. & Chen, Xiaoyan & Ling, Xin & Smith, Tom & Zhu, Yushu, 2017. "Research in finance: A review of influential publications and a research agenda," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 188-199.
    4. Schlag, Christian & Zeng, Kailin, 2019. "Horizontal industry relationships and return predictability," SAFE Working Paper Series 256, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE.
    5. Committee, Nobel Prize, 2013. "Understanding Asset Prices," Nobel Prize in Economics documents 2013-1, Nobel Prize Committee.
    6. Cakici, Nusret & Zaremba, Adam, 2023. "Recency bias and the cross-section of international stock returns," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    7. Schlag, Christian & Zeng, Kailin, 2019. "Horizontal industry relationships and return predictability," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 310-330.
    8. Maio, Paulo & Santa-Clara, Pedro, 2012. "Multifactor models and their consistency with the ICAPM," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(3), pages 586-613.
    9. Cakici, Nusret & Zaremba, Adam, 2021. "Who should be afraid of infections? Pandemic exposure and the cross-section of stock returns," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    10. Christian Fieberg & Daniel Metko & Thorsten Poddig & Thomas Loy, 2023. "Machine learning techniques for cross-sectional equity returns’ prediction," OR Spectrum: Quantitative Approaches in Management, Springer;Gesellschaft für Operations Research e.V., vol. 45(1), pages 289-323, March.
    11. Daniel, Kent & Hirshleifer, David & Teoh, Siew Hong, 2002. "Investor psychology in capital markets: evidence and policy implications," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(1), pages 139-209, January.
    12. Hanauer, Matthias X. & Lauterbach, Jochim G., 2019. "The cross-section of emerging market stock returns," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 265-286.
    13. Cakici, Nusret & Zaremba, Adam, 2021. "Liquidity and the cross-section of international stock returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    14. Hollstein, Fabian, 2022. "The world of anomalies: Smaller than we think?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    15. Huang, Jiekun, 2018. "The customer knows best: The investment value of consumer opinions," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(1), pages 164-182.
    16. Chava, Sudheer & Hsu, Alex & Zeng, Linghang, 2020. "Does history repeat itself? Business cycle and industry returns," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 201-218.
    17. Venturini, Alessio, 2022. "Climate change, risk factors and stock returns: A review of the literature," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    18. Lee, Charles M.C. & Sun, Stephen Teng & Wang, Rongfei & Zhang, Ran, 2019. "Technological links and predictable returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(3), pages 76-96.
    19. Hong, Harrison & Torous, Walter & Valkanov, Rossen, 2007. "Do industries lead stock markets?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(2), pages 367-396, February.
    20. Tobek, Ondrej & Hronec, Martin, 2021. "Does it pay to follow anomalies research? Machine learning approach with international evidence," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 56(C).

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • G0 - Financial Economics - - General
    • G02 - Financial Economics - - General - - - Behavioral Finance: Underlying Principles
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • Q0 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - General
    • Q5 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics
    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming

    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:nbr:nberwo:22890. 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://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.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.