IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/finana/v43y2016icp1-14.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Diamonds vs. precious metals: What shines brightest in your investment portfolio?

Author

Listed:
  • Low, Rand Kwong Yew
  • Yao, Yiran
  • Faff, Robert

Abstract

Several studies explore the use of gold and other precious metals for protecting investors’ wealth during periods of market turmoil. However, alternative investments, although increasing in popularity, still remain unfamiliar to the majority of investors. We explore the safe haven and hedging properties of diamonds versus precious metals in an international study to evaluate diamonds as a viable investment alternative. Furthermore, we compare the performance between the returns of physical diamonds and diamond indices. Our analysis indicates superior performance by precious metals compared to diamonds. However, investors enjoy greater benefit from directly investing in physical diamonds rather than diamond indices. For investors looking to protect their assets against highly volatile market conditions, precious metals remain a better option. Investors should continue to keep abreast of developments with the evolution of the diamond investments industry and physical diamonds can be included in a portfolio for their downside diversification potential.

Suggested Citation

  • Low, Rand Kwong Yew & Yao, Yiran & Faff, Robert, 2016. "Diamonds vs. precious metals: What shines brightest in your investment portfolio?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 1-14.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:finana:v:43:y:2016:i:c:p:1-14
    DOI: 10.1016/j.irfa.2015.11.002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1057521915001726
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.irfa.2015.11.002?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dirk G. Baur & Brian M. Lucey, 2010. "Is Gold a Hedge or a Safe Haven? An Analysis of Stocks, Bonds and Gold," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 45(2), pages 217-229, May.
    2. Białkowski, Jędrzej & Bohl, Martin T. & Stephan, Patrick M. & Wisniewski, Tomasz P., 2015. "The gold price in times of crisis," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 329-339.
    3. Chong, Terence T.L. & Lu, Chenxi & Chan, Wing Hong, 2012. "Long-range dependence in the international diamond market," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 116(3), pages 401-403.
    4. Reboredo, Juan C., 2013. "Is gold a safe haven or a hedge for the US dollar? Implications for risk management," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 2665-2676.
    5. Bampinas, Georgios & Panagiotidis, Theodore, 2015. "Are gold and silver a hedge against inflation? A two century perspective," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 267-276.
    6. Robert B. Durand & Markus Junker & Alex Szimayer, 2010. "The flight‐to‐quality effect: a copula‐based analysis," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 50(2), pages 281-299, June.
    7. Baur, Dirk G. & McDermott, Thomas K., 2010. "Is gold a safe haven? International evidence," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 1886-1898, August.
    8. Renneboog, Luc & Spaenjers, Christophe, 2012. "Hard assets: The returns on rare diamonds and gems," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 220-230.
    9. Michis, Antonis A., 2014. "Investing in gold: Individual asset risk in the long run," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 11(4), pages 369-374.
    10. Charles, Amélie & Darné, Olivier & Kim, Jae H., 2015. "Will precious metals shine? A market efficiency perspective," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 284-291.
    11. Auer, Benjamin R. & Schuhmacher, Frank, 2013. "Diamonds — A precious new asset?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 182-189.
    12. Tim Pullen & Karen Benson & Robert Faff, 2014. "A Comparative Analysis of the Investment Characteristics of Alternative Gold Assets," Abacus, Accounting Foundation, University of Sydney, vol. 50(1), pages 76-92, March.
    13. Bredin, Don & Conlon, Thomas & Potì, Valerio, 2015. "Does gold glitter in the long-run? Gold as a hedge and safe haven across time and investment horizon," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 320-328.
    14. Hood, Matthew & Malik, Farooq, 2013. "Is gold the best hedge and a safe haven under changing stock market volatility?," Review of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 47-52.
    15. Barsky, Robert B, 1989. "Why Don't the Prices of Stocks and Bonds Move Together?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(5), pages 1132-1145, December.
    16. Glosten, Lawrence R & Jagannathan, Ravi & Runkle, David E, 1993. "On the Relation between the Expected Value and the Volatility of the Nominal Excess Return on Stocks," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(5), pages 1779-1801, December.
    17. Laurence E. Blose & Vijay Gondhalekar, 2013. "Weekend gold returns in bull and bear markets," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 53(3), pages 609-622, September.
    18. Hoang, Thi-Hong-Van & Lean, Hooi Hooi & Wong, Wing-Keung, 2015. "Is gold good for portfolio diversification? A stochastic dominance analysis of the Paris stock exchange," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 98-108.
    19. Ciner, Cetin & Gurdgiev, Constantin & Lucey, Brian M., 2013. "Hedges and safe havens: An examination of stocks, bonds, gold, oil and exchange rates," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 202-211.
    20. Capie, Forrest & Mills, Terence C. & Wood, Geoffrey, 2005. "Gold as a hedge against the dollar," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 343-352, October.
    21. Mark, Joy, 2011. "Gold and the US dollar: Hedge or haven?," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 120-131, September.
    22. Ghazali, Mohd Fahmi & Lean, Hooi Hooi & Bahari, Zakaria, 2015. "Sharia compliant gold investment in Malaysia: Hedge or safe haven?," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 192-204.
    23. Pukthuanthong, Kuntara & Roll, Richard, 2011. "Gold and the Dollar (and the Euro, Pound, and Yen)," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 35(8), pages 2070-2083, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. O'Connor, Fergal A. & Lucey, Brian M. & Batten, Jonathan A. & Baur, Dirk G., 2015. "The financial economics of gold — A survey," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 186-205.
    2. Hoang, Thi-Hong-Van & Wong, Wing-Keung & Zhu, Zhenzhen, 2015. "Is gold different for risk-averse and risk-seeking investors? An empirical analysis of the Shanghai Gold Exchange," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 200-211.
    3. Bedoui, Rihab & Guesmi, Khaled & Kalai, Saoussen & Porcher, Thomas, 2020. "Diamonds versus precious metals: What gleams most against USD exchange rates?," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 34(C).
    4. Śmiech, Sławomir & Papież, Monika, 2017. "In search of hedges and safe havens: Revisiting the relations between gold and oil in the rolling regression framework," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 20(C), pages 238-244.
    5. Raza, Naveed & Ali, Sajid & Shahzad, Syed Jawad Hussain & Rehman, Mobeen Ur & Salman, Aneel, 2019. "Can alternative hedging assets add value to Islamic-conventional portfolio mix: Evidence from MGARCH models," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 210-230.
    6. Bilgin, Mehmet Huseyin & Gozgor, Giray & Lau, Chi Keung Marco & Sheng, Xin, 2018. "The effects of uncertainty measures on the price of gold," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 1-7.
    7. Wang, Xinya & Lucey, Brian & Huang, Shupei, 2022. "Can gold hedge against oil price movements: Evidence from GARCH-EVT wavelet modeling," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 27(C).
    8. Joscha Beckmann & Theo Berger & Robert Czudaj, 2019. "Gold price dynamics and the role of uncertainty," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(4), pages 663-681, April.
    9. Cheng, Wan-Hsiu & Chen, Chun-Da & Lai, Hsiao-Pin, 2020. "Revisiting the roles of gold: Does gold ETF matter?," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    10. Ghazali, Mohd Fahmi & Lean, Hooi Hooi & Bahari, Zakaria, 2015. "Sharia compliant gold investment in Malaysia: Hedge or safe haven?," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 192-204.
    11. Abdelbari El Khamlichi & Thi Hong Van Hoang & Wing‐keung Wong, 2016. "Is Gold Different for Islamic and Conventional Portfolios? A Sectorial Analysis," Post-Print hal-02965765, HAL.
    12. He, Qing & Guo, Yongxiu & Yu, Jishuang, 2020. "Nonlinear dynamics of gold and the dollar," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 52(C).
    13. Gomis-Porqueras, Pedro & Shi, Shuping & Tan, David, 2022. "Gold as a financial instrument," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 27(C).
    14. Hoang, Thi-Hong-Van & Zhu, Zhenzhen & El Khamlichi, Abdelbari & Wong, Wing-Keung, 2019. "Does the Shari’ah screening impact the gold-stock nexus? A sectorial analysis," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 617-626.
    15. Thi Hong Van Hoang & Amine Lahiani & David Heller, 2016. "Is gold a hedge against inflation? New evidence from a nonlinear ARDL approach," Post-Print hal-02012307, HAL.
    16. Hoang, Thi Hong Van & Lahiani, Amine & Heller, David, 2016. "Is gold a hedge against inflation? New evidence from a nonlinear ARDL approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 54-66.
    17. Semeyutin, Artur & Downing, Gareth, 2022. "Co-jumps in the U.S. interest rates and precious metals markets and their implications for investors," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    18. Mohd Fahmi Ghazali & Hooi Hooi Lean & Zakaria Bahari, 2019. "Does Gold Investment Offer Protection Against Stock Market Losses? Evidence From Five Countries," The Singapore Economic Review (SER), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 65(02), pages 275-301, August.
    19. Qureshi, Saba & Rehman, Ijaz Ur & Qureshi, Fiza, 2018. "Does gold act as a safe haven against exchange rate fluctuations? The case of Pakistan rupee," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 40(4), pages 685-708.
    20. Nguyen, Quynh Nga & Bedoui, Rihab & Majdoub, Najemeddine & Guesmi, Khaled & Chevallier, Julien, 2020. "Hedging and safe-haven characteristics of Gold against currencies: An investigation based on multivariate dynamic copula theory," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Gold; Diamonds; Safe haven; Hedges; Precious metals; Gold;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G10 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • C11 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Bayesian Analysis: General
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:finana:v:43:y:2016:i:c:p:1-14. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620166 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.