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What Does the Volatility Risk Premium Say About Liquidity Provision and Demand for Hedging Tail Risk?

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  • Jianqing Fan
  • Michael B. Imerman
  • Wei Dai

Abstract

This article provides a data-driven analysis of the volatility risk premium, using tools from high-frequency finance and Big Data analytics. We argue that the volatility risk premium, loosely defined as the difference between realized and implied volatility, can best be understood when viewed as a systematically priced bias. We first use ultra-high-frequency transaction data on SPDRs and a novel approach for estimating integrated volatility on the frequency domain to compute realized volatility. From that we subtract the daily VIX, our measure of implied volatility, to construct a time series of the volatility risk premium. To identify the factors behind the volatility risk premium as a priced bias, we decompose it into magnitude and direction. We find compelling evidence that the magnitude of the deviation of the realized volatility from implied volatility represents supply and demand imbalances in the market for hedging tail risk. It is difficult to conclusively accept the hypothesis that the direction or sign of the volatility risk premium reflects expectations about future levels of volatility. However, evidence supports the hypothesis that the sign of the volatility risk premium is indicative of gains or losses on a delta-hedged portfolio.

Suggested Citation

  • Jianqing Fan & Michael B. Imerman & Wei Dai, 2016. "What Does the Volatility Risk Premium Say About Liquidity Provision and Demand for Hedging Tail Risk?," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(4), pages 519-535, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:jnlbes:v:34:y:2016:i:4:p:519-535
    DOI: 10.1080/07350015.2016.1152968
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    Cited by:

    1. Ruan, Xinfeng & Zhang, Jin E., 2021. "The economics of the financial market for volatility trading," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 52(C).
    2. Juan M. Londono & Nancy R. Xu, 2021. "The Global Determinants of International Equity Risk Premiums," International Finance Discussion Papers 1318, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    3. Michael B. Imerman, 0. "When enough is not enough: bank capital and the Too-Big-To-Fail subsidy," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 0, pages 1-36.
    4. Prasenjit Chakrabarti & Kiran Kumar Kotha, 2017. "Options Order Flow, Volatility Demand and Variance Risk Premium," Multinational Finance Journal, Multinational Finance Journal, vol. 21(2), pages 49-90, June.
    5. Rombouts, Jeroen V.K. & Stentoft, Lars & Violante, Francesco, 2020. "Variance swap payoffs, risk premia and extreme market conditions," Econometrics and Statistics, Elsevier, vol. 13(C), pages 106-124.
    6. Slim, Skander & Dahmene, Meriam & Boughrara, Adel, 2020. "How informative are variance risk premium and implied volatility for Value-at-Risk prediction? International evidence," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 22-37.
    7. Londono, Juan M. & Zhou, Hao, 2017. "Variance risk premiums and the forward premium puzzle," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(2), pages 415-440.
    8. Michael B. Imerman, 2020. "When enough is not enough: bank capital and the Too-Big-To-Fail subsidy," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 55(4), pages 1371-1406, November.
    9. Mora-Valencia, Andrés & Rodríguez-Raga, Santiago & Vanegas, Esteban, 2021. "Skew index: Descriptive analysis, predictive power, and short-term forecast," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 56(C).
    10. Davide Lauria & W. Brent Lindquist & Svetlozar T. Rachev & Yuan Hu, 2023. "Unifying Market Microstructure and Dynamic Asset Pricing," Papers 2304.02356, arXiv.org, revised Feb 2024.

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