IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/inn/wpaper/2020-11.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Market shocks and professionals' investment behavior - Evidence from the COVID-19 crash

Author

Listed:
  • Christoph Huber
  • Jürgen Huber
  • Michael Kirchler

Abstract

We investigate how the experience of extreme events, such as the COVID-19 market crash, influence risk-taking behavior. To isolate changes in risk taking from other factors, we ran controlled experiments with finance professionals in December 2019 and March 2020. We observe that their investments in the experiment were 12 percent lower in March 2020 than in December 2019, although their price expectations had not changed, and although they considered the experimental asset less risky during the crash than before. This lower perceived risk is likely due to adaptive normalization as the volatility during the shock is compared to volatility experienced in real markets (which was low in December 2019, but very high in March 2020). Lower investments during the crash can be supported by higher risk aversion, not by changes in beliefs.

Suggested Citation

  • Christoph Huber & Jürgen Huber & Michael Kirchler, 2020. "Market shocks and professionals' investment behavior - Evidence from the COVID-19 crash," Working Papers 2020-11, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    • Handle: RePEc:inn:wpaper:2020-11
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www2.uibk.ac.at/downloads/c9821000/wpaper/2020-11.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Joseph G. Altonji & Todd E. Elder & Christopher R. Taber, 2005. "Selection on Observed and Unobserved Variables: Assessing the Effectiveness of Catholic Schools," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(1), pages 151-184, February.
    2. Alempaki, Despoina & Starmer, Chris & Tufano, Fabio, 2019. "On the priming of risk preferences: The role of fear and general affect," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 75(PA).
    3. Michael Kirchler & Florian Lindner & Utz Weitzel, 2018. "Rankings and Risk‐Taking in the Finance Industry," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 73(5), pages 2271-2302, October.
    4. A. Ronald Gallant & Chien-Te Hsu & George Tauchen, 1999. "Using Daily Range Data To Calibrate Volatility Diffusions And Extract The Forward Integrated Variance," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 81(4), pages 617-631, November.
    5. Luigi Guiso & Paola Sapienza & Luigi Zingales, 2008. "Trusting the Stock Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(6), pages 2557-2600, December.
    6. Laurent E. Calvet & Paolo Sodini, 2014. "Twin Picks: Disentangling the Determinants of Risk-Taking in Household Portfolios," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 69(2), pages 867-906, April.
    7. Johannes G. Jaspersen & Marc A. Ragin & Justin R. Sydnor, 2020. "Linking subjective and incentivized risk attitudes: The importance of losses," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 60(2), pages 187-206, April.
    8. Elke U. Weber & Niklas Siebenmorgen & Martin Weber, 2005. "Communicating Asset Risk: How Name Recognition and the Format of Historic Volatility Information Affect Risk Perception and Investment Decisions," Risk Analysis, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 25(3), pages 597-609, June.
    9. König-Kersting, Christian & Trautmann, Stefan T., 2018. "Countercyclical risk aversion: Beyond financial professionals," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 18(C), pages 94-101.
    10. Glenn W. Harrison & John A. List, 2004. "Field Experiments," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 42(4), pages 1009-1055, December.
    11. Michael S. Haigh & John A. List, 2005. "Do Professional Traders Exhibit Myopic Loss Aversion? An Experimental Analysis," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(1), pages 523-534, February.
    12. Paolo Crosetto & Antonio Filippin, 2016. "A theoretical and experimental appraisal of four risk elicitation methods," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 19(3), pages 613-641, September.
    13. Cipriani, Marco & Angrisani, Marco & Guarino, Antonio & Kendall, Ryan & Ortiz de Zarate Pina, Julen, 2020. "Risk Preferences at the Time of COVID-19: An Experiment with Professional Traders and Students," CEPR Discussion Papers 15108, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    14. Andersen, Torben G & Bollerslev, Tim, 1997. "Heterogeneous Information Arrivals and Return Volatility Dynamics: Uncovering the Long-Run in High Frequency Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(3), pages 975-1005, July.
    15. Guiso, Luigi & Sapienza, Paola & Zingales, Luigi, 2018. "Time varying risk aversion," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(3), pages 403-421.
    16. Thomas Dohmen & Armin Falk & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde & Jürgen Schupp & Gert G. Wagner, 2011. "Individual Risk Attitudes: Measurement, Determinants, And Behavioral Consequences," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 522-550, June.
    17. Daniel J. Benjamin & James O. Berger & Magnus Johannesson & Brian A. Nosek & E.-J. Wagenmakers & Richard Berk & Kenneth A. Bollen & Björn Brembs & Lawrence Brown & Colin Camerer & David Cesarini & Chr, 2018. "Redefine statistical significance," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 2(1), pages 6-10, January.
      • Daniel Benjamin & James Berger & Magnus Johannesson & Brian Nosek & E. Wagenmakers & Richard Berk & Kenneth Bollen & Bjorn Brembs & Lawrence Brown & Colin Camerer & David Cesarini & Christopher Chambe, 2017. "Redefine Statistical Significance," Artefactual Field Experiments 00612, The Field Experiments Website.
    18. Tobias Adrian & Joshua Rosenberg, 2008. "Stock Returns and Volatility: Pricing the Short‐Run and Long‐Run Components of Market Risk," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(6), pages 2997-3030, December.
    19. Emily Oster, 2019. "Unobservable Selection and Coefficient Stability: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(2), pages 187-204, April.
    20. John Y. Campbell & John Cochrane, 1999. "Force of Habit: A Consumption-Based Explanation of Aggregate Stock Market Behavior," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 107(2), pages 205-251, April.
    21. Grosshans, Daniel & Zeisberger, Stefan, 2018. "All’s well that ends well? On the importance of how returns are achieved," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 397-410.
    22. Cogley, Timothy & Sargent, Thomas J., 2008. "The market price of risk and the equity premium: A legacy of the Great Depression?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(3), pages 454-476, April.
    23. Greenwood, Robin & Nagel, Stefan, 2009. "Inexperienced investors and bubbles," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(2), pages 239-258, August.
    24. Utz Weitzel & Christoph Huber & Jürgen Huber & Michael Kirchler & Florian Lindner & Julia Rose & Lauren Cohen, 2020. "Bubbles and Financial Professionals," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 33(6), pages 2659-2696.
    25. (Jeremy) Chiu, Ching-wai & Harris, Richard D.F. & Stoja, Evarist & Chin, Michael, 2018. "Financial market Volatility, macroeconomic fundamentals and investor Sentiment," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 130-145.
    26. Kirchler, Michael & Lindner, Florian & Weitzel, Utz, 2020. "Delegated investment decisions and rankings," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    27. Luigi Guiso & Paola Sapienza & Luigi Zingales, 2004. "The Role of Social Capital in Financial Development," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(3), pages 526-556, June.
    28. Colin Camerer & Teck-Hua Ho, 1999. "Experience-weighted Attraction Learning in Normal Form Games," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 67(4), pages 827-874, July.
    29. Markus K. Brunnermeier & Stefan Nagel, 2008. "Do Wealth Fluctuations Generate Time-Varying Risk Aversion? Micro-evidence on Individuals," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(3), pages 713-736, June.
    30. Alain Cohn & Jan Engelmann & Ernst Fehr & Michel André Maréchal, 2015. "Evidence for Countercyclical Risk Aversion: An Experiment with Financial Professionals," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(2), pages 860-885, February.
    31. repec:bla:jfinan:v:53:y:1998:i:5:p:1775-1798 is not listed on IDEAS
    32. Christian Ehm & Christine Kaufmann & Martin Weber, 2014. "Volatility Inadaptability: Investors Care About Risk, but Cannot Cope with Volatility," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 18(4), pages 1387-1423.
    33. Chernov, Mikhail & Ronald Gallant, A. & Ghysels, Eric & Tauchen, George, 2003. "Alternative models for stock price dynamics," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 116(1-2), pages 225-257.
    34. Ulrike Malmendier & Stefan Nagel, 2011. "Depression Babies: Do Macroeconomic Experiences Affect Risk Taking?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 126(1), pages 373-416.
    35. Felix Holzmeister & Jürgen Huber & Michael Kirchler & Florian Lindner & Utz Weitzel & Stefan Zeisberger, 2020. "What Drives Risk Perception? A Global Survey with Financial Professionals and Laypeople," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(9), pages 3977-4002, September.
    36. Christoph Huber & Jürgen Huber, 2019. "Scale matters: risk perception, return expectations, and investment propensity under different scalings," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 22(1), pages 76-100, March.
    37. Huber, Christoph & Huber, Jürgen & Kirchler, Michael, 2022. "Volatility shocks and investment behavior," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 194(C), pages 56-70.
    38. Lönnqvist, Jan-Erik & Verkasalo, Markku & Walkowitz, Gari & Wichardt, Philipp C., 2015. "Measuring individual risk attitudes in the lab: Task or ask? An empirical comparison," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 254-266.
    39. Jason Shachat & Matthew J. Walker & Lijia Wei, 2020. "The Impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic on Economic Behaviours and Preferences: Experimental Evidence from Wuhan," Working Papers 20-33, Chapman University, Economic Science Institute.
    40. Alen Nosić & Martin Weber, 2010. "How Riskily Do I Invest? The Role of Risk Attitudes, Risk Perceptions, and Overconfidence," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 7(3), pages 282-301, September.
    41. Markus Glaser & Zwetelina Iliewa & Martin Weber, 2019. "Thinking about Prices versus Thinking about Returns in Financial Markets," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 74(6), pages 2997-3039, December.
    42. Ding, Zhuanxin & Granger, Clive W. J., 1996. "Modeling volatility persistence of speculative returns: A new approach," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 73(1), pages 185-215, July.
    43. Sassan Alizadeh & Michael W. Brandt & Francis X. Diebold, 2002. "Range‐Based Estimation of Stochastic Volatility Models," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 57(3), pages 1047-1091, June.
    44. Christine Kaufmann & Martin Weber & Emily Haisley, 2013. "The Role of Experience Sampling and Graphical Displays on One's Investment Risk Appetite," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(2), pages 323-340, July.
    45. Black, Fischer & Scholes, Myron S, 1973. "The Pricing of Options and Corporate Liabilities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 81(3), pages 637-654, May-June.
    46. Merton, Robert C, 1969. "Lifetime Portfolio Selection under Uncertainty: The Continuous-Time Case," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 51(3), pages 247-257, August.
    47. Anthony Newell & Lionel Page, 2017. "Countercyclical risk aversion and self-reinforcing feedback loops in experimental asset markets," QuBE Working Papers 050, QUT Business School.
    48. Alain Cohn & Ernst Fehr & Michel André Maréchal, 2017. "Do Professional Norms in the Banking Industry Favor Risk-taking?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 30(11), pages 3801-3823.
    49. Nicholas Barberis & Ming Huang & Tano Santos, 2001. "Prospect Theory and Asset Prices," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(1), pages 1-53.
    50. Diacon, Stephen & Hasseldine, John, 2007. "Framing effects and risk perception: The effect of prior performance presentation format on investment fund choice," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 31-52, January.
    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. Huber, Christoph & Huber, Jürgen & Kirchler, Michael, 2022. "Volatility shocks and investment behavior," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 194(C), pages 56-70.
    2. Bu, Di & Hanspal, Tobin & Liao, Yin & Liu, Yong, 2021. "Risk taking, preferences, and beliefs: Evidence from Wuhan," SAFE Working Paper Series 301, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE.
    3. Francisco Gomes & Michael Haliassos & Tarun Ramadorai, 2021. "Household Finance," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 59(3), pages 919-1000, September.
    4. John Ameriks & Gábor Kézdi & Minjoon Lee & Matthew D. Shapiro, 2020. "Heterogeneity in Expectations, Risk Tolerance, and Household Stock Shares: The Attenuation Puzzle," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(3), pages 633-646, July.
    5. Felix Holzmeister & Martin Holmén & Michael Kirchler & Matthias Stefan & Erik Wengström, 2023. "Delegation Decisions in Finance," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(8), pages 4828-4844, August.
    6. Bradbury, Meike A.S. & Hens, Thorsten & Zeisberger, Stefan, 2019. "How persistent are the effects of experience sampling on investor behavior?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 61-79.
    7. Weber, Martin & Kieren, Pascal & Mueller-Dethard, Jan, 2020. "Why so Negative? Belief Formation and Risk Taking in Boom and Bust Markets," CEPR Discussion Papers 14647, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    8. Aragó, V. & Barreda-Tarrazona, I. & Breaban, A. & Matallín, J.C. & Salvador, E., 2022. "Market risk aversion under volatility shifts: An experimental study," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 552-568.
    9. Schwaiger, Rene & Kirchler, Michael & Lindner, Florian & Weitzel, Utz, 2020. "Determinants of investor expectations and satisfaction. A study with financial professionals," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    10. Bottasso, Anna & Duchêne, Sébastien & Guerci, Eric & Hanaki, Nobuyuki & Noussair, Charles N., 2022. "Higher order risk attitudes of financial experts," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C).
    11. Kaustia, Markku & Conlin, Andrew & Luotonen, Niilo, 2023. "What drives stock market participation? The role of institutional, traditional, and behavioral factors," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).
    12. Guiso, Luigi & Sodini, Paolo, 2013. "Household Finance: An Emerging Field," Handbook of the Economics of Finance, in: G.M. Constantinides & M. Harris & R. M. Stulz (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Finance, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1397-1532, Elsevier.
    13. Borsboom, Charlotte & Janssen, Dirk-Jan & Strucks, Markus & Zeisberger, Stefan, 2022. "History matters: How short-term price charts hurt investment performance," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    14. Torben G. Andersen & Tim Bollerslev & Peter F. Christoffersen & Francis X. Diebold, 2005. "Volatility Forecasting," PIER Working Paper Archive 05-011, Penn Institute for Economic Research, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania.
    15. Andersen, Torben G. & Bollerslev, Tim & Christoffersen, Peter F. & Diebold, Francis X., 2006. "Volatility and Correlation Forecasting," Handbook of Economic Forecasting, in: G. Elliott & C. Granger & A. Timmermann (ed.), Handbook of Economic Forecasting, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 15, pages 777-878, Elsevier.
    16. Holzmeister, Felix & Holmén, Martin & Kirchler, Michael & Stefan, Matthias & Wengström, Erik, 2019. "Delegated Decision-Making in Finance," OSF Preprints 3umdf, Center for Open Science.
    17. Cardak, Buly A. & Martin, Vance L., 2023. "Household willingness to take financial risk: Stockmarket movements and life‐cycle effects," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 149(C).
    18. Christoph Huber & Christian König-Kersting & Matteo M. Marini, 2022. "Experimenting with Financial Professionals," Working Papers 2022-07, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck, revised Jun 2024.
    19. Delphine Boutin & Laurène Petifour & Haris Megzari, 2022. "Instability of preferences due to Covid-19 Crisis and emotions: a natural experiment from urban Burkina Faso," Working Papers hal-03623601, HAL.
    20. Guiso, Luigi & Sapienza, Paola & Zingales, Luigi, 2018. "Time varying risk aversion," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(3), pages 403-421.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Experimental finance; countercyclical risk aversion; finance professionals; COVID-19;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • G01 - Financial Economics - - General - - - Financial Crises
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • G41 - Financial Economics - - Behavioral Finance - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making in Financial Markets

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:inn:wpaper:2020-11. 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: Janette Walde (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/fuibkat.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.