IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ysm/somwrk/ysm259.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

What Do We Really Know About the Cross-Sectional Relation Between Past and Expected Returns?

Author

Listed:
  • Tobias J. Moskowitz

    () (Graduate School of Business)

  • Mark Grinblatt

    () (Finance Area)

Abstract

Multihorizon temporal relationships between stock returns are complex due to confounding sources of return premia, microstructure effects, and changes in the relationship over various horizons. We find the relation to be further complicated by the sign and consistency of the past return that also varies, somewhat sensibly, with the season and the tax environment. Accounting for these additional effects using a parsimonious technical trading rule generates surprisingly large abnormal returns, despite controlling for microstructure effects, transaction costs, and date-snooping biases. The documented variation in profits across stock characteristics, season, and tax environment appears inconsistent with existing theory, but may point to future explanations for the relation between past and expected returns.

Suggested Citation

  • Tobias J. Moskowitz & Mark Grinblatt, 2002. "What Do We Really Know About the Cross-Sectional Relation Between Past and Expected Returns?," Yale School of Management Working Papers ysm259, Yale School of Management.
    • Handle: RePEc:ysm:somwrk:ysm259
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=296643
    Download Restriction: no

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Harrison Hong & Terence Lim & Jeremy C. Stein, 2000. "Bad News Travels Slowly: Size, Analyst Coverage, and the Profitability of Momentum Strategies," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(1), pages 265-295, February.
    2. Kent Daniel & David Hirshleifer & Avanidhar Subrahmanyam, 1998. "Investor Psychology and Security Market Under- and Overreactions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(6), pages 1839-1885, December.
    3. Tobias J. Moskowitz & Mark Grinblatt, 1999. "Do Industries Explain Momentum?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 54(4), pages 1249-1290, August.
    4. Keim, Donald B. & Madhavan, Ananth, 1997. "Transactions costs and investment style: an inter-exchange analysis of institutional equity trades," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(3), pages 265-292, December.
    5. Conrad, Jennifer & Kaul, Gautam, 1998. "An Anatomy of Trading Strategies," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 11(3), pages 489-519.
    6. repec:hrv:faseco:30747159 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. De Bondt, Werner F M & Thaler, Richard, 1985. " Does the Stock Market Overreact?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 40(3), pages 793-805, July.
    8. 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.
    9. Andrew W. Lo, A. Craig MacKinlay, 1988. "Stock Market Prices do not Follow Random Walks: Evidence from a Simple Specification Test," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 1(1), pages 41-66.
    10. Fama, Eugene F & French, Kenneth R, 1996. " Multifactor Explanations of Asset Pricing Anomalies," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 51(1), pages 55-84, March.
    11. K. Geert Rouwenhorst, 1998. "International Momentum Strategies," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 53(1), pages 267-284, February.
    12. Keim, Donald B., 1989. "Trading patterns, bid-ask spreads, and estimated security returns : The case of common stocks at calendar turning points," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 75-97, November.
    13. 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.
    14. Fama, Eugene F & French, Kenneth R, 1992. " The Cross-Section of Expected Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 47(2), pages 427-465, June.
    15. Reinganum, Marc R., 1983. "The anomalous stock market behavior of small firms in January : Empirical tests for tax-loss selling effects," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 89-104, June.
    16. Boudoukh, Jacob & Richardson, Matthew & Whitelaw, Robert F, 1994. " Industry Returns and the Fisher Effect," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(5), pages 1595-1615, December.
    17. Lo, Andrew W & MacKinlay, A Craig, 1990. "Data-Snooping Biases in Tests of Financial Asset Pricing Models," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 3(3), pages 431-467.
    18. Carhart, Mark M, 1997. " On Persistence in Mutual Fund Performance," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 57-82, March.
    19. Dyl, Edward A. & Maberly, Edwin D., 1992. "Odd-Lot Transactions around the Turn of the Year and the January Effect," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 27(04), pages 591-604, December.
    20. Barberis, Nicholas & Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert, 1998. "A model of investor sentiment," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(3), pages 307-343, September.
    21. Grinblatt, Mark & Titman, Sheridan & Wermers, Russ, 1995. "Momentum Investment Strategies, Portfolio Performance, and Herding: A Study of Mutual Fund Behavior," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(5), pages 1088-1105, December.
    22. Keim, Donald B., 1983. "Size-related anomalies and stock return seasonality : Further empirical evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 13-32, June.
    23. De Bondt, Werner F M & Thaler, Richard H, 1987. " Further Evidence on Investor Overreaction and Stock Market Seasonalit y," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 42(3), pages 557-581, July.
    24. Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1997. " The Limits of Arbitrage," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 35-55, March.
    25. Jegadeesh N. & Titman S., 1995. "Short-Horizon Return Reversals and the Bid-Ask Spread," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 4(2), pages 116-132, April.
    26. Boudoukh, Jacob & Richardson, Matthew P & Whitelaw, Robert F, 1994. "A Tale of Three Schools: Insights on Autocorrelations of Short-Horizon Stock Returns," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 7(3), pages 539-573.
    27. Dyl, Edward A, 1977. "Capital Gains Taxation and Year-End Stock Market Behavior," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 32(1), pages 165-175, March.
    28. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    29. Conrad, Jennifer & Kaul, Gautam, 1989. "Mean Reversion in Short-Horizon Expected Returns," Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 2(2), pages 225-240.
    30. Donald B. Keim, "undated". "Trading Patterns, Bid-Ask Spreads and Estimated Security Returns: The Case of Common Stocks at Calendar Turning Points (Reprint 008)," Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research Working Papers 22-89, Wharton School Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research.
    31. Chan, K C, 1988. "On the Contrarian Investment Strategy," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 61(2), pages 147-163, April.
    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. Grinblatt, Mark & Keloharju, Matti, 2004. "Tax-loss trading and wash sales," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 51-76, January.
    2. Guo, Hui, 2006. "Time-varying risk premia and the cross section of stock returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 30(7), pages 2087-2107, July.
    3. Bing NMI1 Han & Mark Grinblatt, 2001. "The Disposition Effect and Momentum," Yale School of Management Working Papers ysm239, Yale School of Management.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates

    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:ysm:somwrk:ysm259. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/smyalus.html .

    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 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.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.