The aim of this paper is to investigate the momentum effect in country-level anomalies in global equity markets. By using a sample of 78 countries for the period from 1995 to 2015, we test a set of potential 40 cross-sectional inter-market anomalies, some of which had never been examined before. Based on the findings, according to which half of these return patterns serve as reliable and robust sources of returns, we provide convincing evidence that the anomalies with good performance over the past 6-12 months tend to outperform in the future. Furthermore, the study shows that returns on individual country-level strategies are weakly correlated. Consequently, developing a portfolio consisting of past top-performing strategies may constitute a valuable approach for international investors.
The search and investigation of stock market anomalies have always been a popular area of research among the academicians. The Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) that was once very well accepted and adored the most dominant place in the traditional finance theories, somehow, in recent times, the validity of the same has been questioned. The evidence of various stock market anomalies that document excess profit making opportunities resulted in critical re-examination of EMH. Probably the two most famous anomalies that have attracted the interest of both academicians and practitioners are the ones that are based on stocks return continuation (known as momentum effect) and long-term stock returns reversal (known as overreaction effect). Ever since DeBondt and Thaler (1985) and Jegadeesh and Titman (1993) drew attention towards the overreaction and momentum effect, these have remained as some of the most hotly debated anomalies in the academic literature. The investment strategies based on such continuation and long-term return reversal effects are commonly known as momentum and contrarian strategies, respectively. Both momentum and long-term reversal effect were found to persist in a majority of the out-of-sample tests using data from the U.S. as well as other developed stock markets across different time periods. Initially, most of the early investigations were based on the U.S. stock market, but gradually the investigation for the same spread out internationally to other developed stock markets. As a result, there exists a vast majority of literature supporting momentum and contrarian profitability in majority of the developed markets.
The Efficient Market Hypothesis believes that it is impossible for an investor to outperform the market because all available information is already built into stock prices. However, some anomalies could persist in stock markets while some other anomalies could appear, disappear and re-appear again without any warning. A Special Issue on "Efficiency and Anomalies in Stock Markets" will be devoted to advancements in the theoretical development of market efficiency and anomaly in the Stock Market, as well as applications in Stock Market efficiency and anomalies.
Investment pioneer Len Zacks presents the latest academic research on how to beat the market using equity anomalies The Handbook of Equity Market Anomalies organizes and summarizes research carried out by hundreds of finance and accounting professors over the last twenty years to identify and measure equity market inefficiencies and provides self-directed individual investors with a framework for incorporating the results of this research into their own investment processes. Edited by Len Zacks, CEO of Zacks Investment Research, and written by leading professors who have performed groundbreaking research on specific anomalies, this book succinctly summarizes the most important anomalies that savvy investors have used for decades to beat the market. Some of the anomalies addressed include the accrual anomaly, net stock anomalies, fundamental anomalies, estimate revisions, changes in and levels of broker recommendations, earnings-per-share surprises, insider trading, price momentum and technical analysis, value and size anomalies, and several seasonal anomalies. This reliable resource also provides insights on how to best use the various anomalies in both market neutral and in long investor portfolios. A treasure trove of investment research and wisdom, the book will save you literally thousands of hours by distilling the essence of twenty years of academic research into eleven clear chapters and providing the framework and conviction to develop market-beating strategies. Strips the academic jargon from the research and highlights the actual returns generated by the anomalies, and documented in the academic literature Provides a theoretical framework within which to understand the concepts of risk adjusted returns and market inefficiencies Anomalies are selected by Len Zacks, a pioneer in the field of investing As the founder of Zacks Investment Research, Len Zacks pioneered the concept of the earnings-per-share surprise in 1982 and developed the Zacks Rank, one of the first anomaly-based stock selection tools. Today, his firm manages U.S. equities for individual and institutional investors and provides investment software and investment data to all types of investors. Now, with his new book, he shows you what it takes to build a quant process to outperform an index based on academically documented market inefficiencies and anomalies.
The book begins by building upon the established, conventional principles of finance that you've have already learned in your principles course. The authors then move into psychological principles of behavioral finance, including heuristics and biases, overconfidence, emotion and social forces. You immediately see how human behavior influences the decisions of individual investors and professional finance practitioners, managers, and markets. You also gain a strong understanding of how social forces impact individuals' choices. The book clearly explains what behavioral finance indicates about observed market outcomes as well as how psychological biases potentially impact the behavior of managers. The book's solid academic approach provides opportunities for you to utilize theory and complete applications in every chapter as you learn the implications of behavioral finance on retirement, pensions, education, debiasing, and client management. The book spends a significant amount of time examining how today's practitioners can use behavioral finance to further their professional success.
Are the quantitative equity strategies for country selection robust to implementation costs? To answer this question, we conduct a comprehensive examination of the country-level strategies so far. We review, classify, and replicate 120 equity anomalies within a sample of 42 country equity indices for the years 1996-2017. Next, using ETF price and spread data, we test the effect of real-life conditions and trading costs on the anomaly performance. We also examine three cost-mitigation strategies: infrequent rebalancing, capitalization-based weighting, and focus on low-cost securities. We find that 46% of the long-only monthly rebalanced anomaly portfolios display significant alphas, concentrated strongly among strategies based on value, momentum, and liquidity. The effect of transaction costs proves largely lethal to returns, leaving only a handful of anomalies profitable. Less frequent rebalancing (annually) helps to regain the effectiveness of the strategies, increasing the monthly alphas on the long-only anomaly portfolios to 0.44% on average.
This book demonstrates how quantitative country-level investment strategies can be successfully employed to manage money in international markets. It offers a range of state-of-the-art quantitative strategies, describing their theoretical bases, implementation details, and performance in over 70 countries between 1995 and 2015. International diversification has long been a key to stable investing. However, the increased integration and openness of global financial markets has led to rising correlations between stock market returns in particular countries, driving down the benefits of diversification and increasing the importance of country selection strategies as part of an investment process. Zaremba and Shemer explain the efficiency of quantitative investing, which captures huge amounts of data of limited scope very quickly. In the traditional approach, this data compilation is an immense undertaking, limited in scope and vulnerable to behavioral errors, but this can be overcome with the help of a new paradigm of quantitative investment at the country level. Quantitative country asset allocation can be efficiently accomplished by using wealth insights that have been generated in the academic literature, discovering many anomalies and regular patterns in asset prices. Armed with this information, investors and managers can process large amounts of data more efficiently when deciding to invest in ETFs, index funds, or futures markets.
There are hundreds of exhibits in the investment "factor zoo." Which ones are actually worth your time, and your money? Andrew L. Berkin and Larry E. Swedroe, co-authors of The Incredible Shrinking Alpha, bring you a thorough yet still jargon-free and accessible guide to applying one of today's most valuable quantitative, evidence-based approaches to outperforming the market: factor investing. Designed for savvy investors and professional advisors alike, Your Complete Guide to Factor-Based Investing: The Way Smart Money Invests Today takes you on a journey through the land of academic research and an extensive review of its 50-year quest to uncover the secret of successful investing. Along the way, Berkin and Swedroe cite and distill more than 100 academic papers on finance and introduce five unique criteria that a factor (at its most basic, a characteristic or set of characteristics common among a broad set of securities) must meet to be considered worthy of your investment. In addition to providing explanatory power to portfolio returns and delivering a premium, Swedroe and Berkin argue a factor should be persistent, pervasive, robust, investable and intuitive. By the end, you'll have learned that, within the entire "factor zoo," only certain exhibits are worth visiting and only a handful of factors are required to invest in the same manner that made Warren Buffett a legend. Your Complete Guide to Factor-Based Investing: The Way Smart Money Invests Today offers an in-depth look at the evidence practitioners use to build portfolios and how you as an investor can benefit from that knowledge, rendering it an essential resource for making the informed and prudent investment decisions necessary to help secure your financial future.
