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Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis Vol. 52 No. 6 2017

Equity Volatility Term Structures and the Cross Section of Option Returns

Aurelio Vasquez

Abstract

The slope of the implied volatility term structure is positively related to future option returns. I rank firms based on the slope of the volatility term structure and analyze the returns for straddle portfolios. Straddle portfolios with high slopes of the volatility term structure outperform straddle portfolios with low slopes by an economically and statistically significant amount. The results are robust to different empirical setups and are not explained by traditional factors, higher-order option factors, or jump risk.

DOI
10.1017/s002210901700076x
Volume
52
Issue
6
Pages
2727-2754
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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