Performance Convergence Analysis of Stock Exchanges: the Situation of the Ibovespa in the World Scenario

This paper studies the behavior of the most relevant worldwide stock exchanges indices. The semiparametric time series technique proposed by Phillips and Sul (2007) is used to a panel containing 36 stock exchanges allocated in economies with different development levels situated on all continents, during the period from January 1998 to December 2007. According to the results, there is no common trend, corroborating Antzolautos et al. (2009). The traditional São Paulo Stock Exchange Index (Ibovespa) is the oldest one of the group with the highest level of the trend for the dynamic transition, which is comprised by volatile indices of stock exchanges with a reasonable level of maturity, located in developing economies with high rates of inflation in Central and Latin America. The second club comprises most of the indices, characterized by a higher level of maturity and tradition of financial markets and development, located mainly in Europe, North America and Asia. The third club with only four indices, has no clear patterns. The evidence that the convergence clubs composition has macroeconomic, geographical and financial patterns can be a useful to infer about the post world financial crisis behavior of stock exchanges.