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COVID-19 pandemic and capital markets: the role of government responses

Author

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  • Christian Beer

    (TU Dortmund University)

  • Janine Maniora

    (Heinrich-Heine-University Düsseldorf)

  • Christiane Pott

    (TU Dortmund University)

Abstract

This paper analyzes the moderation effect of government responses on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, proxied by the daily growth in COVID-19 cases and deaths, on the capital market, i.e., the S&P 500 firm’s daily returns. Using the Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker, we monitor 16 daily indicators for government actions across the fields of containment and closure, economic support, and health for 180 countries in the period from January 1, 2020 to March 15, 2021. We find that government responses mitigate the negative stock market impact and that investors’ sentiment is sensitive to a firm’s country-specific revenue exposure to COVID-19. Our findings indicate that the mitigation effect is stronger for firms that are highly exposed to COVID-19 on the sales side. In more detail, containment and closure policies and economic support mitigate negative stock market impacts, while health system policies support further declines. For firms with high revenue exposure to COVID-19, the mitigation effect is stronger for government economic support and health system initiatives. Containment and closure policies do not mitigate stock price declines due to growing COVID-19 case numbers. Our results hold even after estimating the spread of the pandemic with an epidemiological standard model, namely, the susceptible-infectious-recovered model.

Suggested Citation

  • Christian Beer & Janine Maniora & Christiane Pott, 2023. "COVID-19 pandemic and capital markets: the role of government responses," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 93(1), pages 11-57, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:jbecon:v:93:y:2023:i:1:d:10.1007_s11573-022-01103-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s11573-022-01103-x
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    Cited by:

    1. Wolfgang Breuer & Jannis Bischof & Oliver Fabel & Christian Hofmann & Jochen Hundsdoerfer & Tim Weitzel, 2023. "Business economics in a pandemic world: how a virus changed our economic life," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 93(1), pages 1-9, January.
    2. Minh Thi Hong Dinh, 2023. "How Does Market Cap Play Its Role in Returns during COVID-19? The Case of Norway," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 16(9), pages 1-13, September.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    COVID-19; Government policies; Investor sentiment; Capital market; Sales revenue; Behavioral finance;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G18 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • G41 - Financial Economics - - Behavioral Finance - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making in Financial Markets
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • C23 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Models with Panel Data; Spatio-temporal Models

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