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Review of Finance Vol. 23 No. 4 2019

Asymmetric Volatility Risk: Evidence from Option Markets

Jens Carsten Jackwerth1; Grigory Vilkov2

1 University of Konstanz and · 2 Frankfurt School of Finance and Management

open access

Abstract

Asymmetric volatility concerns the relation of returns to future expected volatility. Much is known from option prices about the marginal risk-neutral distributions (RNDs) of S&P 500 returns and of relative changes in future expected volatility (VIX). While the bivariate RND cannot be inferred from the marginals, we propose a novel identification based on long-dated index options. We estimate the risk-neutral asymmetric volatility implied correlation (AVIC) and find it to be significantly lower than its realized counterpart. We interpret the economics of the asymmetric volatility correlation risk premium and use AVIC to predict returns, volatility, and risk-neutral quantities.

DOI
10.1093/rof/rfy025
Volume
23
Issue
4
Pages
777-799
Language
en
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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