IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cpr/ceprdp/17592.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Book-to-Market, Mispricing, and the Cross-Section of Corporate Bond Returns

Author

Listed:
  • Bartram, Söhnke
  • Grinblatt, Mark
  • Nozawa, Yoshio

Abstract

Corporate bonds’ book-to-market ratios predict returns computed from transaction prices. Senior bonds (even investment-grade) with the 20% highest ratios outperform the 20% lowest by 3%–4% annually after non-parametrically controlling for numerous liquidity, default, microstructure, and priced-risk attributes: yield-to-maturity, bid-ask-spread, duration/maturity, credit spread/rating, past returns, coupon, size, age, industry, and structural model equity hedges. Spreads for all-bond samples are larger. An efficient bond market would not exhibit the observed decay in the ratio’s predictive efficacy with implementation delays, small yield-to-maturity spreads, or similar-sized spreads across bonds with differing risk. A methodological innovation avoids liquidity filters and censorship that bias returns.

Suggested Citation

  • Bartram, Söhnke & Grinblatt, Mark & Nozawa, Yoshio, 2022. "Book-to-Market, Mispricing, and the Cross-Section of Corporate Bond Returns," CEPR Discussion Papers 17592, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:17592
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cepr.org/publications/DP17592
    Download Restriction: CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fama, Eugene F & French, Kenneth R, 1992. "The Cross-Section of Expected Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 47(2), pages 427-465, June.
    2. repec:bla:jfinan:v:53:y:1998:i:5:p:1563-1587 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Turan G. Bali & Amit Goyal & Dashan Huang & Fuwei Jiang & Quan Wen, 2020. "The Cross-Sectional Pricing of Corporate Bonds Using Big Data and Machine Learning," Swiss Finance Institute Research Paper Series 20-110, Swiss Finance Institute.
    4. Novy-Marx, Robert, 2013. "The other side of value: The gross profitability premium," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(1), pages 1-28.
    5. Blume, Marshall E. & Stambaugh, Robert F., 1983. "Biases in computed returns : An application to the size effect," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 387-404, November.
    6. Basu, Sanjoy, 1983. "The relationship between earnings' yield, market value and return for NYSE common stocks : Further evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 129-156, June.
    7. Jaewon Choi & Yesol Huh & Sean Seunghun Shin, 2024. "Customer Liquidity Provision: Implications for Corporate Bond Transaction Costs," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 70(1), pages 187-206, January.
    8. Yoshio Nozawa, 2017. "What Drives the Cross-Section of Credit Spreads?: A Variance Decomposition Approach," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(5), pages 2045-2072, October.
    9. James L. Davis & Eugene F. Fama & Kenneth R. French, 2000. "Characteristics, Covariances, and Average Returns: 1929 to 1997," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 55(1), pages 389-406, February.
    10. Scott Joslin & Marcel Priebsch & Kenneth J. Singleton, 2014. "Risk Premiums in Dynamic Term Structure Models with Unspanned Macro Risks," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 69(3), pages 1197-1233, June.
    11. Asquith, Paul & Au, Andrea S. & Covert, Thomas & Pathak, Parag A., 2013. "The market for borrowing corporate bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(1), pages 155-182.
    12. Bai, Jennie & Bali, Turan G. & Wen, Quan, 2019. "Common risk factors in the cross-section of corporate bond returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(3), pages 619-642.
    13. John H. Cochrane & Monika Piazzesi, 2005. "Bond Risk Premia," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 138-160, March.
    14. Schaefer, Stephen M. & Strebulaev, Ilya A., 2008. "Structural models of credit risk are useful: Evidence from hedge ratios on corporate bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(1), pages 1-19, October.
    15. Gebhardt, William R. & Hvidkjaer, Soeren & Swaminathan, Bhaskaran, 2005. "The cross-section of expected corporate bond returns: Betas or characteristics?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(1), pages 85-114, January.
    16. Louis H. Fritzemeier, 1936. "Relative Price Fluctuations of Industrial Stocks in Different Price Groups," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9, pages 133-133.
    17. Hendrik Bessembinder & Kathleen M. Kahle & William F. Maxwell & Danielle Xu, 2009. "Measuring Abnormal Bond Performance," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(10), pages 4219-4258, October.
    18. Kewei Hou & G. Andrew Karolyi & Bong-Chan Kho, 2011. "What Factors Drive Global Stock Returns?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 24(8), pages 2527-2574.
    19. Chordia, Tarun & Shivakumar, Lakshmanan, 2006. "Earnings and price momentum," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(3), pages 627-656, June.
    20. Joshua Livnat & Richard R. Mendenhall, 2006. "Comparing the Post–Earnings Announcement Drift for Surprises Calculated from Analyst and Time Series Forecasts," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(1), pages 177-205, March.
    21. Berk, Jonathan B, 1995. "A Critique of Size-Related Anomalies," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 8(2), pages 275-286.
    22. Banz, Rolf W., 1981. "The relationship between return and market value of common stocks," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 3-18, March.
    23. Jack Bao & Jun Pan & Jiang Wang, 2011. "The Illiquidity of Corporate Bonds," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 66(3), pages 911-946, June.
    24. Chordia, Tarun & Goyal, Amit & Nozawa, Yoshio & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar & Tong, Qing, 2017. "Are Capital Market Anomalies Common to Equity and Corporate Bond Markets? An Empirical Investigation," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 52(4), pages 1301-1342, August.
    25. Gergana Jostova & Stanislava Nikolova & Alexander Philipov & Christof W. Stahel, 2013. "Momentum in Corporate Bond Returns," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(7), pages 1649-1693.
    26. Marshall Blume & Robert Stambaugh, "undated". "Biases in Computed Returns: An Application to the Size Effect (Revision of 2-83)," Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research Working Papers 11-83, Wharton School Rodney L. White Center for Financial Research.
    27. Chung, Kee H. & Wang, Junbo & Wu, Chunchi, 2019. "Volatility and the cross-section of corporate bond returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(2), pages 397-417.
    28. Fama, Eugene F. & French, Kenneth R., 1993. "Common risk factors in the returns on stocks and bonds," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 3-56, February.
    29. Ball, R & Brown, P, 1968. "Empirical Evaluation Of Accounting Income Numbers," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 6(2), pages 159-178.
    30. Anna Cieslak & Pavol Povala, 2015. "Expected Returns in Treasury Bonds," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 28(10), pages 2859-2901.
    31. Newey, Whitney & West, Kenneth, 2014. "A simple, positive semi-definite, heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation consistent covariance matrix," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 33(1), pages 125-132.
    32. Clifford S. Asness & Tobias J. Moskowitz & Lasse Heje Pedersen, 2013. "Value and Momentum Everywhere," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 68(3), pages 929-985, June.
    33. Bartram, Söhnke M. & Grinblatt, Mark, 2018. "Agnostic fundamental analysis works," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(1), pages 125-147.
    34. Long Chen & David A. Lesmond & Jason Wei, 2007. "Corporate Yield Spreads and Bond Liquidity," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(1), pages 119-149, February.
    35. Bachrach, Benjamin & Galai, Dan, 1979. "The Risk-Return Relationship and Stock Prices," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(2), pages 421-441, June.
    36. Narasimhan Jegadeesh & Sheridan Titman, 2001. "Profitability of Momentum Strategies: An Evaluation of Alternative Explanations," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(2), pages 699-720, April.
    37. Fama, Eugene F & Bliss, Robert R, 1987. "The Information in Long-Maturity Forward Rates," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(4), pages 680-692, September.
    38. Amy K. Edwards & Lawrence E. Harris & Michael S. Piwowar, 2007. "Corporate Bond Market Transaction Costs and Transparency," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(3), pages 1421-1451, June.
    39. Jegadeesh, Narasimhan & Titman, Sheridan, 1993. "Returns to Buying Winners and Selling Losers: Implications for Stock Market Efficiency," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 48(1), pages 65-91, March.
    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. Bartram, Söhnke M. & Grinblatt, Mark, 2021. "Global market inefficiencies," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(1), pages 234-259.
    2. Zhang, Heming & Wang, Guanying, 2021. "Reversal effect and corporate bond pricing in China," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 70(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. Doron Avramov & Tarun Chordia & Gergana Jostova & Alexander Philipov, 2022. "The Distress Anomaly is Deeper than You Think: Evidence from Stocks and Bonds [The prediction of corporate bankruptcy: a discriminant analysis]," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 26(2), pages 355-405.
    2. Guo, Xu & Lin, Hai & Wu, Chunchi & Zhou, Guofu, 2022. "Predictive information in corporate bond yields," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 59(PB).
    3. Zaremba Adam & Konieczka Przemysław, 2017. "Size, Value, and Momentum in Polish Equity Returns: Local or International Factors?," International Journal of Management and Economics, Warsaw School of Economics, Collegium of World Economy, vol. 53(3), pages 26-47, September.
    4. Bai, Jennie & Bali, Turan G. & Wen, Quan, 2021. "Is there a risk-return tradeoff in the corporate bond market? Time-series and cross-sectional evidence," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 142(3), pages 1017-1037.
    5. Stephen A. Gorman & Frank J. Fabozzi, 2021. "The ABC’s of the alternative risk premium: academic roots," Journal of Asset Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 22(6), pages 405-436, October.
    6. Eero Pätäri & Timo Leivo, 2017. "A Closer Look At Value Premium: Literature Review And Synthesis," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(1), pages 79-168, February.
    7. Adam Zaremba & Jacob Koby Shemer, 2018. "Price-Based Investment Strategies," Springer Books, Springer, number 978-3-319-91530-2, June.
    8. Bartram, Söhnke M. & Grinblatt, Mark, 2021. "Global market inefficiencies," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(1), pages 234-259.
    9. Kewei Hou & Chen Xue & Lu Zhang, 2017. "Replicating Anomalies," NBER Working Papers 23394, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Söhnke M. Bartram & Harald Lohre & Peter F. Pope & Ananthalakshmi Ranganathan, 2021. "Navigating the factor zoo around the world: an institutional investor perspective," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 91(5), pages 655-703, July.
    11. Choi, Jaewon & Kim, Yongjun, 2018. "Anomalies and market (dis)integration," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 16-34.
    12. Pätäri, Eero & Karell, Ville & Luukka, Pasi & Yeomans, Julian S, 2018. "Comparison of the multicriteria decision-making methods for equity portfolio selection: The U.S. evidence," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 265(2), pages 655-672.
    13. Bartram, Söhnke M. & Grinblatt, Mark, 2018. "Agnostic fundamental analysis works," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(1), pages 125-147.
    14. Ray Ball & Gil Sadka & Ayung Tseng, 2022. "Using accounting earnings and aggregate economic indicators to estimate firm-level systematic risk," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 27(2), pages 607-646, June.
    15. Andrew Ang & Assaf A. Shtauber & Paul C. Tetlock, 2013. "Asset Pricing in the Dark: The Cross-Section of OTC Stocks," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(12), pages 2985-3028.
    16. Amit Goyal, 2012. "Empirical cross-sectional asset pricing: a survey," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 26(1), pages 3-38, March.
    17. Franke, Benedikt & Müller, Sebastian & Müller, Sonja, 2017. "The q-factors and expected bond returns," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 19-35.
    18. repec:fau:fauart:v:65:y:2015:i:1:p:84-104 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Cakici, Nusret & Zaremba, Adam & Bianchi, Robert J. & Pham, Nga, 2021. "False discoveries in the anomaly research: New insights from the Stock Exchange of Melbourne (1927–1987)," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    20. Stephanie Heck, 2022. "Corporate bond yields and returns: a survey," Financial Markets and Portfolio Management, Springer;Swiss Society for Financial Market Research, vol. 36(2), pages 179-201, June.
    21. Chen, Xi & Wang, Junbo & Wu, Chunchi & Wu, Di, 2024. "Extreme illiquidity and cross-sectional corporate bond returns," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Corporate bonds; Market efficiency; Credit risk; Transaction costs; Point-in-time (pit); Book-to-market;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading

    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:cpr:ceprdp:17592. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cepr.org .

    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.