IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/finlet/v31y2019icp26-31.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Momentum and the Halloween Indicator: Evidence of a new seasonal pattern in momentum returns

Author

Listed:
  • Bhootra, Ajay

Abstract

We report that momentum loser and winner portfolios earn much higher returns over November to April (winter) compared with May to October (summer). Specifically, the average monthly loser (winner) portfolio return is −0.46% (0.77%) over summer, and 1.72% (2.50%) over winter. This seasonal pattern is consistent with the relatively superior performance of the broader equity market over winter months (the “Halloween Indicator”). A modified momentum strategy designed to exploit this seasonal pattern has a much higher average return and Sharpe ratio than the conventional momentum strategy.

Suggested Citation

  • Bhootra, Ajay, 2019. "Momentum and the Halloween Indicator: Evidence of a new seasonal pattern in momentum returns," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 26-31.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:finlet:v:31:y:2019:i:c:p:26-31
    DOI: 10.1016/j.frl.2019.04.013
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1544612318307554
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.frl.2019.04.013?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. Antoniou, Constantinos & Doukas, John A. & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 2013. "Cognitive Dissonance, Sentiment, and Momentum," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(1), pages 245-275, February.
    2. Harrison Hong & Terence Lim & Jeremy C. Stein, 2000. "Bad News Travels Slowly: Size, Analyst Coverage, and the Profitability of Momentum Strategies," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(1), pages 265-295, February.
    3. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:5:p:2145-2176 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 2015. "A five-factor asset pricing model," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1), pages 1-22.
    5. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    6. Ji, Xiuqing & Martin, J. Spencer & Yao, Yaqiong, 2017. "Macroeconomic risk and seasonality in momentum profits," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 76-90.
    7. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:3:p:1345-1365 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Doron Avramov & Tarun Chordia & Gergana Jostova & Alexander Philipov, 2007. "Momentum and Credit Rating," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(5), pages 2503-2520, October.
    9. Sven Bouman & Ben Jacobsen, 2002. "The Halloween Indicator, "Sell in May and Go Away": Another Puzzle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1618-1635, December.
    10. John M. Griffin & Xiuqing Ji & J. Spencer Martin, 2003. "Momentum Investing and Business Cycle Risk: Evidence from Pole to Pole," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(6), pages 2515-2547, December.
    11. Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Titman, Sheridan, 1993. "Returns to Buying Winners and Selling Losers: Implications for Stock Market Efficiency," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(1), pages 65-91, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Song, Jian & Balvers, Ronald J., 2022. "Seasonality and momentum across national equity markets," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    2. Ali, Fahad & Ülkü, Numan, 2021. "Quest for a parsimonious factor model in the wake of quality-minus-junk, misvaluation and Fama-French-six factors," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 41(C).
    3. Wang, Jun & Song, Xiuna, 2022. "The effect of limited attention and risk attitude on left-tail reversal: Empirical results from a-share data in China," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 46(PA).

    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. Adam Zaremba & Jacob Koby Shemer, 2018. "Price-Based Investment Strategies," Springer Books, Springer, number 978-3-319-91530-2, June.
    2. Ming Gu & Minxing Sun & Yangru Wu & Weike Xu, 2021. "Economic policy uncertainty and momentum," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 50(1), pages 237-259, March.
    3. Tobias Wiest, 2023. "Momentum: what do we know 30 years after Jegadeesh and Titman’s seminal paper?," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 37(1), pages 95-114, March.
    4. Zhu, Zhaobo & Duan, Xinrui & Sun, Licheng & Tu, Jun, 2019. "Momentum and reversal: The role of short selling," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 95-110.
    5. Haga, Jesper, 2015. "Intermediate-term momentum and credit rating," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 15(C), pages 59-67.
    6. Liu, Chenye & Wu, Ying & Zhu, Dongming, 2022. "Price overreaction to up-limit events and revised momentum strategies in the Chinese stock market," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 114(C).
    7. Israel, Ronen & Moskowitz, Tobias J., 2013. "The role of shorting, firm size, and time on market anomalies," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(2), pages 275-301.
    8. Amit Goyal, 2012. "Empirical cross-sectional asset pricing: a survey," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 26(1), pages 3-38, March.
    9. Shi, Huai-Long & Zhou, Wei-Xing, 2021. "Horse race of weekly idiosyncratic momentum strategies with respect to various risk metrics: Evidence from the Chinese stock market," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C).
    10. Galariotis, Emilios C., 2010. "What should we know about momentum investing? The case of the Australian Security Exchange," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 18(4), pages 369-389, September.
    11. Zhang, Heming & Wang, Guanying, 2021. "Reversal effect and corporate bond pricing in China," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    12. Ma, Yao & Yang, Baochen & Su, Yunpeng, 2021. "Stock return predictability: Evidence from moving averages of trading volume," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    13. Houda BenMabrouk & Ismahen Souayeh, 2021. "Momentum profits: Fundamentals or time varying unsystematic risk," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(1), pages 777-789, January.
    14. Bohl, Martin T. & Czaja, Marc-Gregor & Kaufmann, Philipp, 2016. "Momentum profits, market cycles, and rebounds: Evidence from Germany," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 139-159.
    15. Blanco, Ivan & De Jesus, Miguel & Remesal, Alvaro, 2023. "Overlapping momentum portfolios," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 1-22.
    16. Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 2018. "Equity market momentum: A synthesis of the literature and suggestions for future work," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 291-296.
    17. Peter Nyberg & Salla Pöyry, 2014. "Firm Expansion and Stock Price Momentum," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 18(4), pages 1465-1505.
    18. Chaonan Lin & Nien‐Tzu Yang & Robin K. Chou & Kuan‐Cheng Ko, 2022. "A timing momentum strategy," Accounting and Finance, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 62(S1), pages 1339-1379, April.
    19. Avanidhar Subrahmanyam, 2010. "The Cross†Section of Expected Stock Returns: What Have We Learnt from the Past Twenty†Five Years of Research?," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 16(1), pages 27-42, January.
    20. Martin H. Schmidt, 2017. "Trading strategies based on past returns: evidence from Germany," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 31(2), pages 201-256, May.

    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:finlet:v:31:y:2019:i:c:p:26-31. 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/frl .

    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.