IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jbfina/v95y2018icp64-81.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Speculation, risk aversion, and risk premiums in the crude oil market

Author

Listed:
  • Li, Bingxin

Abstract

Speculative activity in commodity markets has increased dramatically since 2002. This paper investigates how aggregate risk aversion and risk premiums in the crude oil market covary with the level of speculation. Using crude oil futures and option data, we estimate aggregate risk aversion in the crude oil market and find that it is significantly lower between 2005 and 2008 when speculative activity increases dramatically. Risk premiums implied by the state-dependent risk aversion are also negatively correlated with speculative activity and are on average lower and more volatile during this period. These findings, together with the increased index fund and managed-money infusion in the commodity market, suggest that speculators who demand commodity futures for the purpose of portfolio diversification are willing to accept lower compensation for their positions. Decreasing speculation after 2009 amid increased producers’ hedging demand has a reverse impact on the market risk aversion and risk premiums.

Suggested Citation

  • Li, Bingxin, 2018. "Speculation, risk aversion, and risk premiums in the crude oil market," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 64-81.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbfina:v:95:y:2018:i:c:p:64-81
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jbankfin.2018.06.002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378426618301201
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jbankfin.2018.06.002?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. Adrian, Tobias & Shin, Hyun Song, 2010. "Liquidity and leverage," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 19(3), pages 418-437, July.
    2. Büyükşahin, Bahattin & Robe, Michel A., 2014. "Speculators, commodities and cross-market linkages," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 38-70.
    3. Michel A. Robe & Jonathan Wallen, 2016. "Fundamentals, Derivatives Market Information and Oil Price Volatility," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(4), pages 317-344, April.
    4. Hong, Harrison & Yogo, Motohiro, 2012. "What does futures market interest tell us about the macroeconomy and asset prices?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(3), pages 473-490.
    5. Anders B. Trolle & Eduardo S. Schwartz, 2009. "Unspanned Stochastic Volatility and the Pricing of Commodity Derivatives," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(11), pages 4423-4461, November.
    6. Kenneth J. Singleton, 2014. "Investor Flows and the 2008 Boom/Bust in Oil Prices," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(2), pages 300-318, February.
    7. Ait-Sahalia, Yacine & Lo, Andrew W., 2000. "Nonparametric risk management and implied risk aversion," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 94(1-2), pages 9-51.
    8. Breeden, Douglas T & Litzenberger, Robert H, 1978. "Prices of State-contingent Claims Implicit in Option Prices," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 51(4), pages 621-651, October.
    9. Peter Christoffersen & Steven Heston & Kris Jacobs, 2013. "Capturing Option Anomalies with a Variance-Dependent Pricing Kernel," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(8), pages 1963-2006.
    10. Berkowitz, Jeremy, 2001. "Testing Density Forecasts, with Applications to Risk Management," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 19(4), pages 465-474, October.
    11. Bahattin Büyükşahin & Jeffrey H. Harris, 2011. "Do Speculators Drive Crude Oil Futures Prices?," The Energy Journal, , vol. 32(2), pages 167-202, April.
    12. Beckmann, Joscha & Belke, Ansgar & Czudaj, Robert, 2014. "Does global liquidity drive commodity prices?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 224-234.
    13. Barone-Adesi, Giovanni & Whaley, Robert E, 1987. "Efficient Analytic Approximation of American Option Values," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 42(2), pages 301-320, June.
    14. Erkko Etula, 2013. "Broker-Dealer Risk Appetite and Commodity Returns," Journal of Financial Econometrics, Oxford University Press, vol. 11(3), pages 486-521, June.
    15. Working, Holbrook, 1960. "Speculation on Hedging Markets," Food Research Institute Studies, Stanford University, Food Research Institute, vol. 1(2), pages 1-36.
    16. Hui Guo & Robert F. Whitelaw, 2006. "Uncovering the Risk–Return Relation in the Stock Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(3), pages 1433-1463, June.
    17. Jackwerth, Jens Carsten, 2000. "Recovering Risk Aversion from Option Prices and Realized Returns," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 13(2), pages 433-451.
    18. Ing-Haw Cheng & Andrei Kirilenko & Wei Xiong, 2015. "Convective Risk Flows in Commodity Futures Markets," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 19(5), pages 1733-1781.
    19. Acharya, Viral V. & Lochstoer, Lars A. & Ramadorai, Tarun, 2013. "Limits to arbitrage and hedging: Evidence from commodity markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(2), pages 441-465.
    20. Scott H. Irwin & Dwight R. Sanders, 2011. "Index Funds, Financialization, and Commodity Futures Markets," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 33(1), pages 1-31.
    21. Ait-Sahalia, Yacine & Wang, Yubo & Yared, Francis, 2001. "Do option markets correctly price the probabilities of movement of the underlying asset?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 102(1), pages 67-110, May.
    22. Brunetti, Celso & Reiffen, David, 2014. "Commodity index trading and hedging costs," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 21(C), pages 153-180.
    23. Duffie, Darrell & Jackson, Matthew O., 1990. "Optimal hedging and equilibrium in a dynamic futures market," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 21-33, February.
    24. Rosenberg, Joshua V. & Engle, Robert F., 2002. "Empirical pricing kernels," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(3), pages 341-372, June.
    25. Black, Fischer, 1976. "The pricing of commodity contracts," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(1-2), pages 167-179.
    26. Hamilton, James D. & Wu, Jing Cynthia, 2014. "Risk premia in crude oil futures prices," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 9-37.
    27. repec:bla:jfinan:v:59:y:2004:i:1:p:407-446 is not listed on IDEAS
    28. Litzenberger, Robert H & Rabinowitz, Nir, 1995. "Backwardation in Oil Futures Markets: Theory and Empirical Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 50(5), pages 1517-1545, December.
    29. Bessembinder, Hendrik, 1992. "Systematic Risk, Hedging Pressure, and Risk Premiums in Futures Markets," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 5(4), pages 637-667.
    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. Xiao, Jihong & Wang, Yudong, 2022. "Macroeconomic uncertainty, speculation, and energy futures returns: Evidence from a quantile regression," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 241(C).
    2. Naomi Boyd & Bingxin Li & Rui Liu, 2022. "Risk premia in the term structure of crude oil futures: long-run and short-run volatility components," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 58(4), pages 1505-1533, May.
    3. Dedi, Valentina & Mandilaras, Alex, 2022. "Trader positions and the price of oil in the futures market," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 448-460.
    4. Dong, Yang & Wen, Shu-hui & Hu, Xiao-bing & Li, Jiang-Cheng, 2020. "Stochastic resonance of drawdown risk in energy market prices," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 540(C).
    5. Riza Demirer & Konstantinos Gkillas & Rangan Gupta & Christian Pierdzioch, 2022. "Risk aversion and the predictability of crude oil market volatility: A forecasting experiment with random forests," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 73(8), pages 1755-1767, August.
    6. Kang, Boda & Nikitopoulos, Christina Sklibosios & Prokopczuk, Marcel, 2020. "Economic determinants of oil futures volatility: A term structure perspective," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    7. Georges Prat & Remzi Uctum, 2021. "Modeling ex-ante risk premia in the oil market," Working Papers hal-03508699, HAL.
    8. Chang, Chiu-Lan, 2024. "Extreme events, economic uncertainty and speculation on occurrences of price bubbles in crude oil futures," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    9. Hsieh, Hui-Ching & Nguyen, Van Quoc Thinh, 2021. "Economic policy uncertainty and illiquidity return premium," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).
    10. Xiao, Jihong & Wen, Fenghua & He, Zhifang, 2023. "Impact of geopolitical risks on investor attention and speculation in the oil market: Evidence from nonlinear and time-varying analysis," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 267(C).
    11. Li, Jiang-Cheng & Leng, Na & Zhong, Guang-Yan & Wei, Yu & Peng, Jia-Sheng, 2020. "Safe marginal time of crude oil price via escape problem of econophysics," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    12. Gao, Xin & Li, Bingxin & Liu, Rui, 2023. "The relative pricing of WTI and Brent crude oil futures: Expectations or risk premia?," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 30(C).

    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. Boyd, Naomi E. & Harris, Jeffrey H. & Li, Bingxin, 2018. "An update on speculation and financialization in commodity markets," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 10(C), pages 91-104.
    2. James D. Hamilton & Jing Cynthia Wu, 2015. "Effects Of Index‐Fund Investing On Commodity Futures Prices," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 56(1), pages 187-205, February.
    3. Lang, Korbinian & Auer, Benjamin R., 2020. "The economic and financial properties of crude oil: A review," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 52(C).
    4. Yan, Lei & Irwin, Scott H. & Sanders, Dwight R., 2017. "Identifying the Impact of Financialization in Commodity Futures Prices from Index Rebalancing," 2017 Annual Meeting, July 30-August 1, Chicago, Illinois 258504, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    5. Loïc Maréchal, 2023. "A tale of two premiums revisited," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(5), pages 580-614, May.
    6. Büyükşahin, Bahattin & Robe, Michel A., 2014. "Speculators, commodities and cross-market linkages," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 38-70.
    7. Lim, Terence & Lo, Andrew W. & Merton, Robert C. & Scholes, Myron S., 2006. "The Derivatives Sourcebook," Foundations and Trends(R) in Finance, now publishers, vol. 1(5–6), pages 365-572, April.
    8. Yan, Lei & Irwin, Scott H. & Sanders, Dwight R., 2018. "Mapping algorithms, agricultural futures, and the relationship between commodity investment flows and crude oil futures prices," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 486-504.
    9. Mohammad Isleimeyyeh, 2020. "The role of financial investors in determining the commodity futures risk premium," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 40(9), pages 1375-1397, September.
    10. Ing-Haw Cheng & Wei Xiong, 2014. "Financialization of Commodity Markets," Annual Review of Financial Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 6(1), pages 419-441, December.
    11. Sanders, Dwight R. & Irwin, Scott H., 2014. "Energy futures prices and commodity index investment: New evidence from firm-level position data," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(S1), pages 57-68.
    12. Jacobs, Kris & Li, Bingxin, 2023. "Option Returns, Risk Premiums, and Demand Pressure in Energy Markets," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    13. Ames, Matthew & Bagnarosa, Guillaume & Matsui, Tomoko & Peters, Gareth W. & Shevchenko, Pavel V., 2020. "Which risk factors drive oil futures price curves?," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    14. Filippo Natoli, 2018. "Analyzing the structural transformation of commodity markets: financialization revisited," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 419, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    15. Awan, Obaid A., 2019. "Price discovery or noise: The role of arbitrage and speculation in explaining crude oil price behaviour," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 16(C).
    16. Figuerola-Ferretti, Isabel & McCrorie, J. Roderick & Paraskevopoulos, Ioannis, 2020. "Mild explosivity in recent crude oil prices," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    17. Jensen, Christian Skov & Lando, David & Pedersen, Lasse Heje, 2019. "Generalized recovery," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(1), pages 154-174.
    18. Bredin, Don & O'Sullivan, Conall & Spencer, Simon, 2021. "Forecasting WTI crude oil futures returns: Does the term structure help?," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(C).
    19. Francisco Alonso & Roberto Blanco & Gonzalo Rubio, 2009. "Option-implied preferences adjustments, density forecasts, and the equity risk premium," Spanish Economic Review, Springer;Spanish Economic Association, vol. 11(2), pages 141-164, June.
    20. Yao, Wei & Alexiou, Constantinos, 2024. "On the transmission mechanism between the inventory arbitrage activity, speculative activity and the commodity price under the US QE policy: Evidence from a TVP-VAR model," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 89(PA), pages 1054-1072.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Crude oil; Futures; Options; Speculation; Risk aversion; Risk premium;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G13 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Contingent Pricing; Futures Pricing
    • G17 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Financial Forecasting and Simulation

    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:jbfina:v:95:y:2018:i:c:p:64-81. 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/jbf .

    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.