A comparative VaR analysis between low-frequency and high-frequency conditional EVT models during COVID-19 crisis

The aim of this paper is to assess whether the availability of high-frequency data enhances the accuracy of extreme market risk estimation in comparison to low-frequency data by using Value-at-risk (VaR) and Expected shortfall (ES). The sample data used for analysis comprised the daily closing stock prices and 5-minute intraday stock prices of DJIA, FTSE100, BOVESPA, and MERVAL Index from 2014 to 2022. The data analysis was done to compare the performance of two-stages hybrid methods called conditional EVT that combined the GARCH, RV and HAR specification models with the EVT approach. To assess the accuracy of the VaR forecasts, out-of-sample VaR forecast was backtested by using unconditional coverage (UC) and conditional coverage (CC) tests. The VaR backtesting procedure also incorporated the utilization loss function which are the regulatory loss function (RLF) and the firm’s loss function (FLF). The accuracy of the forecasted ES was backtested by using the generalized breach indicator (GBI) method. The findings of this research emphasized that high-frequency conditional EVT, incorporating the HAR specification outperformed the low-frequency conditional EVT in predicting market risk during periods characterized by extreme returns. Based on the VaR and ES measure, the HAR-EVT typed models are the best performance model compared to the GARCH-EVT and RV-EVT typed models during both crisis and non-crisis periods. This research study contributes to the current literature on the forecasting ability of risk models by concentrating on the hybrid model of long-memory models (FIEGARCH, RV-FIEGARCH and HAR-FIEGARCH) for with the EVT approach.The analysis compares the performance of two-stages hybrid methods called conditional EVT that combined the GARCH, RV and HAR specification models with the EVT approach during non-crisis and crisis COVID-19 pandemic. Based on the VaR and ES measure, the HAR-EVT typed models are the best performance model compared to the GARCH-EVT and RV-EVT typed models. The findings of this research study are also beneficial to market participants, especially those who engage in high-frequency trading to utilize the RV and HAR models as well the application of the EVT model to measure the potential risks and detect any vulnerabilities in financial systems especially during a sudden market crash.