IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ant/wpaper/2012027.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Did federal funds target rate changes affect the market value of insurance companies?

Author

Listed:
  • DE CEUSTER, Marc J.K.
  • LI, Jie
  • ZHANG, Hairui

Abstract

In this paper, we study the sensitivity of insurance companies’ stock returns with respect to expected and unexpected changes in the Federal funds target rate over the period 1988-2007. We confirm Bernanke and Kuttner (2005) that, as stocks in general, insurance stock returns are only sensitive to the unexpected changes in the Federal funds target rate, but not to the expected ones. However, market-adjusted stock returns do only show a reaction for the non-life insurers. For life insurers, there does not seem to be an industry specific effect on their market value. This can be explained by the business models life and nonlife insurers adopt.

Suggested Citation

  • DE CEUSTER, Marc J.K. & LI, Jie & ZHANG, Hairui, 2012. "Did federal funds target rate changes affect the market value of insurance companies?," Working Papers 2012027, University of Antwerp, Faculty of Business and Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:ant:wpaper:2012027
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://repository.uantwerpen.be/docman/irua/86aa19/cbba462c.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ben S. Bernanke & Kenneth N. Kuttner, 2005. "What Explains the Stock Market's Reaction to Federal Reserve Policy?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(3), pages 1221-1257, June.
    2. Chen, Carl R & Chan, Anthony, 1989. "Interest Rate Sensitivity, Asymmetry, and the Stock Returns of Financial Institutions," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 24(3), pages 457-473, August.
    3. Chen, Carl R. & Mohan, Nancy J. & Steiner, Thomas L., 1999. "Discount rate changes, stock market returns, volatility, and trading volume: Evidence from intraday data and implications for market efficiency," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 23(6), pages 897-924, June.
    4. Guo, Hui, 2004. "Stock prices, firm size, and changes in the federal funds rate target," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(4), pages 487-507, September.
    5. Bento J. Lobo, 2002. "Interest Rate Surprises and Stock Prices," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 37(1), pages 73-91, February.
    6. Kuttner, Kenneth N., 2001. "Monetary policy surprises and interest rates: Evidence from the Fed funds futures market," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(3), pages 523-544, June.
    7. Stone, Bernell K., 1974. "Systematic Interest-Rate Risk in a Two-Index Model of Returns," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 9(5), pages 709-721, November.
    8. Lee, Jae Ha & Stock, Duane R., 2000. "Embedded options and interest rate risk for insurance companies, banks and other financial institutions," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 40(2), pages 169-187.
    9. Haiyan Yin & Jiawen Yang & William C. Handorf, 2010. "State Dependency Of Bank Stock Reaction To Federal Funds Rate Target Changes," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 33(3), pages 289-315, September.
    10. Giliberto, Michael, 1985. "Interest Rate Sensitivity in the Common Stocks of Financial Intermediaries: A Methodological Note," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 20(1), pages 123-126, March.
    11. Flannery, Mark J & James, Christopher M, 1984. "The Effect of Interest Rate Changes on the Common Stock Returns of Financial Institutions," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 39(4), pages 1141-1153, September.
    12. Sung C. Bae, 1990. "Interest Rate Changes And Common Stock Returns Of Financial Institutions: Revisited," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 13(1), pages 71-79, March.
    13. Elijah Brewer & James M. Carson & Elyas Elyasiani & Iqbal Mansur & William L. Scott, 2007. "Interest Rate Risk and Equity Values of Life Insurance Companies: A GARCH–M Model," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 74(2), pages 401-423, June.
    14. William Poole & Robert H. Rasche, 2003. "The impact of changes in FOMC disclosure practices on the transparency of monetary policy: are markets and the FOMC better "synched"?," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 85(Jan), pages 1-10.
    15. William Poole & Robert H. Rasche & Daniel L. Thornton, 2002. "Market anticipations of monetary policy actions," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 84(Jul), pages 65-94.
    16. David F. Babbel & Anthony M. Santomero, 1997. "Risk Management by Insurers: An Analysis of the Process," Center for Financial Institutions Working Papers 96-16, Wharton School Center for Financial Institutions, University of Pennsylvania.
    17. Doherty, Neil A. & Kang, Han Bin, 1988. "Interest rates and insurance price cycles," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 12(2), pages 199-214, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Papadamou, Stephanos & Siriopoulos, Costas, 2014. "Interest rate risk and the creation of the Monetary Policy Committee: Evidence from banks’ and life insurance companies’ stocks in the UK," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 45-67.
    2. Kamil Saba & Janusz Kudła, 2014. "The impact of NBP’s interest rate changes on the changes and volatility of WIG20," Ekonomia journal, Faculty of Economic Sciences, University of Warsaw, vol. 37.
    3. Haiyan Yin & Jiawen Yang & William C. Handorf, 2010. "State Dependency Of Bank Stock Reaction To Federal Funds Rate Target Changes," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 33(3), pages 289-315, September.
    4. Tyler K. Jensen & Robert R. Johnson & Michael J. McNamara, 2019. "Funding conditions and insurance stock returns: Do insurance stocks really benefit from rising interest rate regimes?," Risk Management and Insurance Review, American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 22(4), pages 367-391, December.
    5. Salvatore Perdichizzi, 2017. "The impact of ECBs conventional and unconventional monetary policies on European banking indexes returns," DISCE - Working Papers del Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza def059, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    6. Alexandros Kontonikas & Alexandros Kostakis, 2013. "On Monetary Policy and Stock Market Anomalies," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(7-8), pages 1009-1042, September.
    7. Farka, Mira, 2009. "The effect of monetary policy shocks on stock prices accounting for endogeneity and omitted variable biases," Review of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 47-55, January.
    8. Chris Florackis & Alexandros Kontonikas & Alexandros Kostakis, 2010. "Transmission of macro-liquidity shocks to liquidity-sorted stock portfolios’ returns: The role of the financial crisis," Working Papers 2011_22, Business School - Economics, University of Glasgow, revised Apr 2011.
    9. Theodor Kohers & Robert Nagy, 1991. "An Examination Of The Interest Rate Sensitivity Of Commercial Bank Stock," Review of Financial Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 1(1), pages 23-34, September.
    10. Pariyada Sukcharoensin, 2013. "Time-Varying Market, Interest Rate and Exchange Rate Risks of Thai Commercial Banks," Asian Academy of Management Journal of Accounting and Finance (AAMJAF), Penerbit Universiti Sains Malaysia, vol. 9(1), pages 25-45.
    11. Eric Wong & Jim Wong & Phyllis Leung, 2008. "The Foreign Exchange Exposure of Chinese Banks," Working Papers 0807, Hong Kong Monetary Authority.
    12. Söhnke Bartram, 2002. "The Interest Rate Exposure of Nonfinancial Corporations," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 6(1), pages 101-125.
    13. Elyas Elyasiani & Iqbal Mansur & Jill Wetmore, 2010. "Real-Estate Risk Effects on Financial Institutions’ Stock Return Distribution: a Bivariate GARCH Analysis," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 89-107, January.
    14. Haiyan Yin & Yang, 2013. "Bank characteristics and stock reactions to federal funds rate target changes," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(23), pages 1755-1764, December.
    15. English, William B. & Van den Heuvel, Skander J. & Zakrajšek, Egon, 2018. "Interest rate risk and bank equity valuations," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 80-97.
    16. Smales, L.A. & Apergis, N., 2017. "Does more complex language in FOMC decisions impact financial markets?," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 171-189.
    17. Duane B. Graddy & Reuben Kyle & Thomas H. Strickland, 1994. "The Differential Effects Of Deregulation On Savings And Loan Associations And Banks," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 17(2), pages 289-300, June.
    18. Brian Du, 2020. "Securitized banking and interest rate sensitivity," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 54(3), pages 851-876, April.
    19. Smales, L.A., 2021. "Macroeconomic news and treasury futures return volatility: Do treasury auctions matter?," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    20. Sekandary, Ghezal & Bask, Mikael, 2023. "Monetary policy uncertainty, monetary policy surprises and stock returns," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Interest rate shocks; Insurance companies; Federal funds target rate changes;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E42 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Monetary Sytsems; Standards; Regimes; Government and the Monetary System
    • E43 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Interest Rates: Determination, Term Structure, and Effects
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • G22 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Insurance; Insurance Companies; Actuarial Studies

    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:ant:wpaper:2012027. 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: Joeri Nys (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ftufsbe.html .

    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.