Dimitrios Malliaropulos

Mean reversion in Southeast Asian stock markets

Abstract This paper assesses the predictable component of South East Asian stock markets using a bootstrap resampling method to estimate the small sample distributions of variance ratio statistics. We find evidence of mean reversion in long horizon dollar adjusted excess returns. The robustness of the results is assessed by adjusting stock returns for potential time-varying expected returns and partial integration of these emerging markets into world capital markets. In all but one case, mean reversion is shown to be due to either time-variation of risk exposure and prices of risk or partial integration of the local market into world stock markets. These results clearly illustrate the dangers of testing market efficiency without carefully adjusting stock returns for time variation in expected returns and the partial integration of local markets into world markets.

A note on nonstationarity, structural breaks, and the Fisher effect

Abstract We find empirical evidence that inflation, nominal, and real interest rates in the US are trend-stationary with a structural break in both the unconditional mean and the drift rate of a deterministic trend, which occurs shortly after the change in operating procedures of the Fed in September 1979. This finding casts some doubts on cointegration tests of the long-run Fisher effect conducted in recent studies, since the results of these tests can be affected by the existence of common structural breaks in the series. We propose an alternative test of the Fisher effect, based on a VAR representation in appropriately detrended variables. We find strong support for the Fisher effect both in the medium term and in the long term.

The Impact of Globalization on the Equity Cost of Capital

The advent of the single currency within the European Union provides a natural experiment to measure how the cost of equity changes as globalization takes place. This is because the launch of the single currency has led to the elimination of currency-related restrictions on the composition of institutional investors’ portfolios and, hence, to increased risk sharing among EU investors. We focus not only on the impact of globalization on the level of the cost of equity, but also on the cross-country and cross-sectoral dispersion in the cost of capital. Over the 1990s it is shown that the cost of equity within EU sectors falls by between 0.5 and 3 percentage points. There is strong evidence of convergence in the cost of equity across different countries in the same sector. Convergence across different sectors is small. An implication for portfolio management is that country effects are becoming smaller and sector effects larger.

International stock return differentials and real exchange rate changes

Abstract This article investigates the link between international stock return differentials relative to the US and deviations from relative Purchasing Power Parity. Assuming that the real exchange rate and the relative stock price between two countries contain both permanent and temporary components, we are able to derive a relationship between expected stock return differentials between the same two countries and expected changes in the real exchange rate in terms of observables. The predictions of the model are tested empirically using stock market indices of four major OECD countries relative to the US. The empirical results indicate that there is a negative relationship between stock return differentials against the US and changes in the real exchange rate, i.e. stock markets outperform the US stock market in countries where the currency appreciates in real terms against the dollar.

The Yield Spread as a Symmetric Predictor of Output and Inflation

We present evidence that the predictive ability of the yield spread for short-run inflation is related to its predictive ability for economic activity. In particular, an increase in the slope of the term structure predicts an increase in output growth and a decrease in inflation of equal magnitude. In order to explain this finding, we develop a monetary asset-pricing model with sticky goods prices. Sticky prices imply that economic disturbances generate predictable changes in output and inflation, thus allowing for intertemporal substitution effects and changes in the slope of the yield curve. We derive analytic solutions of the covariance between the nominal yield spread and future output growth and inflation and show that a moderate degree of price stickiness and relatively high degree of intertemporal substitution can account for the observed correlations in the US data over the period 1960:Q1 - 2003:Q2.

Excess stock returns and news: evidence from European markets

This paper aims at decomposing the forecast error variance of excess returns in five major European stock markets into the variance of news about future excess returns, dividends and real interest rates. Special emphasis is given on the issue of stationarity and structural breaks in the unconditional mean of dividend yields and their implications for variance decompositions. Empirical results indicate that in some markets the dividend yield is subject to structural breaks in the mean. Evidence from Monte Carlo simulations suggests that this kind of structural breaks cause small-sample bias in variance decompositions of a magnitude comparable to bias introduced by unit roots. Our results constitute a warning about return decompositions that, in particular, use variables in the forecasting equations that may be nonstationary or contain a structural break.

Stock Prices, Returns and Dividend Yields

The predictive ability of the dividend-price ratio for future stock returns does not necessarily imply that dividend-price ratios predict future stock prices. Stock returns consist of both a capital gain and a dividend yield component, and we show that predictability of stock returns by lagged dividend-price ratios mainly reflects predictability of future dividend yields, which make up a significant component of average returns. We propose a novel loglinear approximation of stock returns into a capital gain and a dividend yield component and derive testable restrictions of nonpredictability of capital gains. Using Monte Carlo simulations, we show that not accounting for the dividend yield component of returns leads to overrejections of unpredictability both in one-period and multi-period tests. Our results have wide-ranging implications for the way we think financial markets work, asset pricing and asset allocation.

Testing Long-Run PPP in the Presence of Sticky Prices

In this paper we show that standard tests for long-run Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) are misspecified if aggregate prices are sticky. Using Monte Carlo simulations, we show that in small samples the ADF test has low power to reject the null of no cointegration when long-run PPP is tested using current prices instead of long-run equilibrium prices. We propose an alternative two-step testing procedure, which consists of, first, estimating long-run equilibrium prices from a standard money demand function and, then, testing long-run PPP as a relationship between the current exchange rate and long-run \QTR{em}{equilibrium} price differentials. Finally, we show that in small samples our proposed test has considerably higher power than the standard ADF test for a unit root in the real exchange rate. We apply our test to the effective exchange rate of the Greek drachma in the post-Bretton Woods period and find that it is closely linked to long-run equilibrium price differentials.