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Journal of Financial Economics Vol. 83 No. 2 2007

Do industries lead stock markets?

Harrison Hong1; Walter Torous2; Rossen Valkanov2

1 Princeton University · 2 UCLA, 110 Westwood Plaza, Los Angeles, CA, 90095-1481, USA

Abstract

We investigate whether the returns of industry portfolios predict stock market movements. In the US, a significant number of industry returns, including retail, services, commercial real estate, metal, and petroleum, forecast the stock market by up to two months. Moreover, the propensity of an industry to predict the market is correlated with its propensity to forecast various indicators of economic activity. The eight largest non-US stock markets show remarkably similar patterns. These findings suggest that stock markets react with a delay to information contained in industry returns about their fundamentals and that information diffuses only gradually across markets.

DOI
10.1016/j.jfineco.2005.09.010
Volume
83
Issue
2
Pages
367-396
Language
en
Sources
crossref bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex

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