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American Economic Review Vol. 97 No. 2 2007

Market Maker Inventories and Stock Prices

Terrence Hendershott; Mark S. Seasholes

Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley, 545 Student Services Bldg. #1900, Berkeley, CA 94720-1900.

Abstract

Empirical studies linking liquidity provision to asset prices follow naturally from inventory models. Liquidity suppliers and market markers profit from providing immediacy to less patient investors, but have limited inventory-carrying and risk-bearing capacity. Similarly, limits to arbitrage arguments rely on certain market participants accommodating buying or selling pressure. These liquidity suppliers/arbitrageurs are willing to accommodate trades—and, therefore, hold suboptimal portfolios—only if they are able to buy (sell) at a discount (premium) relative to future prices. Thus, large liquidity-supplier inventories should coincide with large buying or selling pressure, which causes price movements that subsequently reverse themselves. By identifying and studying the inventories of traders who are central to the trading process and whose primary roll is to provide liquidity—New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) market

DOI
10.1257/aer.97.2.210
Volume
97
Issue
2
Pages
210-214
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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