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Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis Vol. 41 No. 2 2006

Stock Returns, Implied Volatility Innovations, and the Asymmetric Volatility Phenomenon

Patrick Dennis1; Stewart Mayhew2; Chris Stivers3

1 University of Virginia · 2 United States Securities and Exchange Commission · 3 University of Georgia

Abstract

We study the dynamic relation between daily stock returns and daily innovations in optionderived implied volatilities. By simultaneously analyzing innovations in index- and firmlevel implied volatilities, we distinguish between innovations in systematic and idiosyncratic volatility in an effort to better understand the asymmetric volatility phenomenon. Our results indicate that the relation between stock returns and innovations in systematic volatility (idiosyncratic volatility) is substantially negative (near zero). These results suggest that asymmetric volatility is primarily attributed to systematic market-wide factors rather than aggregated firm-level effects. We also present evidence that supports our assumption that innovations in implied volatility are good proxies for innovations in expected stock volatility.

DOI
10.1017/s0022109000002118
Volume
41
Issue
2
Pages
381-406
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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