IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/esprep/198037.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Noise trading and informational efficiency

Author

Listed:
  • Zhang, Chris H.
  • Frijns, Bart

Abstract

We investigate how noise trading affects informational efficiency of financial markets. Using full order book data from the Australian Securities Exchange, we find that noise trading harms informational efficiency. However, this is driven mainly by higher levels of noise trading, indicating that not all noise trading has the same effects. Further, behind the aggregate effects lies rich heterogeneity in how noise trading affects informational efficiency cross-sectionally. Noise trading harms informational efficiency of large liquid stocks but can be beneficial in small illiquid stocks, indicating that markets interpret noise trading differently. Finally, our results suggest that current regulation such as European-wide financial transaction tax (FTT) could have unintended effects on market quality. Instead, carefully designing a tax policy considering both firm-level characteristics and different levels of noise trading is more likely to be an optimal regulatory response.

Suggested Citation

  • Zhang, Chris H. & Frijns, Bart, 2019. "Noise trading and informational efficiency," EconStor Preprints 198037, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:esprep:198037
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Berkman, Henk & Koch, Paul D., 2008. "Noise trading and the price formation process," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 232-250, March.
    2. Dergiades, Theologos, 2012. "Do investors’ sentiment dynamics affect stock returns? Evidence from the US economy," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 116(3), pages 404-407.
    3. Xuemin (Sterling) Yan & Zhe Zhang, 2009. "Institutional Investors and Equity Returns: Are Short-term Institutions Better Informed?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(2), pages 893-924, February.
    4. Shleifer, Andrei & Summers, Lawrence H, 1990. "The Noise Trader Approach to Finance," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 4(2), pages 19-33, Spring.
    5. Chordia, Tarun & Roll, Richard & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 2011. "Recent trends in trading activity and market quality," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(2), pages 243-263, August.
    6. Cornell, Bradford & Sirri, Erik R, 1992. "The Reaction of Investors and Stock Prices to Insider Trading," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 47(3), pages 1031-1059, July.
    7. Brad M. Barber & Terrance Odean & Ning Zhu, 2009. "Do Retail Trades Move Markets?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(1), pages 151-186, January.
    8. Grossman, Sanford J & Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1980. "On the Impossibility of Informationally Efficient Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(3), pages 393-408, June.
    9. Lao, Jiashun & Nie, He & Jiang, Yonghong, 2018. "Revisiting the investor sentiment–stock returns relationship: A multi-scale perspective using wavelets," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 499(C), pages 420-427.
    10. Malcolm Baker & Jeffrey Wurgler, 2006. "Investor Sentiment and the Cross‐Section of Stock Returns," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(4), pages 1645-1680, August.
    11. De Long, J Bradford & Andrei Shleifer & Lawrence H. Summers & Robert J. Waldmann, 1990. "Noise Trader Risk in Financial Markets," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(4), pages 703-738, August.
    12. Richard W. Sias, 2004. "Institutional Herding," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 17(1), pages 165-206.
    13. Shores, D, 1990. "The Association Between Interim Information And Security Returns Surrounding Earnings Announcements," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(1), pages 164-181.
    14. Glosten, Lawrence R. & Milgrom, Paul R., 1985. "Bid, ask and transaction prices in a specialist market with heterogeneously informed traders," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 71-100, March.
    15. John Y. Campbell & Sanford J. Grossman & Jiang Wang, 1993. "Trading Volume and Serial Correlation in Stock Returns," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(4), pages 905-939.
    16. Hendershott, Terrence & Livdan, Dmitry & Schürhoff, Norman, 2015. "Are institutions informed about news?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(2), pages 249-287.
    17. Thierry Foucault & David Sraer & David J. Thesmar, 2011. "Individual Investors and Volatility," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 66(4), pages 1369-1406, August.
    18. Jean†Edouard Colliard & Peter Hoffmann, 2017. "Financial Transaction Taxes, Market Composition, and Liquidity," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(6), pages 2685-2716, December.
    19. Lee, Charles M C & Ready, Mark J, 1991. "Inferring Trade Direction from Intraday Data," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(2), pages 733-746, June.
    20. Shahzad, Hassan & Duong, Huu Nhan & Kalev, Petko S. & Singh, Harminder, 2014. "Trading volume, realized volatility and jumps in the Australian stock market," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 414-430.
    21. Verma, Rahul & Verma, Priti, 2007. "Noise trading and stock market volatility," Journal of Multinational Financial Management, Elsevier, vol. 17(3), pages 231-243, July.
    22. repec:bla:jfinan:v:43:y:1988:i:1:p:83-95 is not listed on IDEAS
    23. Lee, Wayne Y. & Jiang, Christine X. & Indro, Daniel C., 2002. "Stock market volatility, excess returns, and the role of investor sentiment," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 26(12), pages 2277-2299.
    24. Amihud, Yakov, 2002. "Illiquidity and stock returns: cross-section and time-series effects," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 31-56, January.
    25. De Bondt, Werner F M & Thaler, Richard, 1985. "Does the Stock Market Overreact?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 40(3), pages 793-805, July.
    26. Chordia, Tarun & Roll, Richard & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 2000. "Commonality in liquidity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 3-28, April.
    27. Dow, James & Gorton, Gary, 1997. "Noise Trading, Delegated Portfolio Management, and Economic Welfare," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(5), pages 1024-1050, October.
    28. Terrence Hendershott & Charles M. Jones, 2005. "Island Goes Dark: Transparency, Fragmentation, and Regulation," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 18(3), pages 743-793.
    29. John Y. Campbell & Albert S. Kyle, 1993. "Smart Money, Noise Trading and Stock Price Behaviour," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 60(1), pages 1-34.
    30. Comerton-Forde, Carole & Putniņš, Tālis J., 2015. "Dark trading and price discovery," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(1), pages 70-92.
    31. Asani Sarkar & Robert A. Schwartz, 2009. "Market Sidedness: Insights into Motives for Trade Initiation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(1), pages 375-423, February.
    32. Chung, Dennis & Hrazdil, Karel, 2010. "Liquidity and market efficiency: A large sample study," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(10), pages 2346-2357, October.
    33. Choi, Nicole & Sias, Richard W., 2009. "Institutional industry herding," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(3), pages 469-491, December.
    34. Fama, Eugene F, 1970. "Efficient Capital Markets: A Review of Theory and Empirical Work," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 25(2), pages 383-417, May.
    35. Alexander Kurov, 2008. "Investor Sentiment, Trading Behavior and Informational Efficiency in Index Futures Markets," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 43(1), pages 107-127, February.
    36. Kyle, Albert S, 1985. "Continuous Auctions and Insider Trading," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 53(6), pages 1315-1335, November.
    37. Andrew W. Lo, A. Craig MacKinlay, 1988. "Stock Market Prices do not Follow Random Walks: Evidence from a Simple Specification Test," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 1(1), pages 41-66.
    38. Hiemstra, Craig & Jones, Jonathan D, 1994. "Testing for Linear and Nonlinear Granger Causality in the Stock Price-Volume Relation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(5), pages 1639-1664, December.
    39. Fong, Kingsley Y. L. & Gallagher, David R. & Lee, Adrian D., 2014. "Individual Investors and Broker Types," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 49(2), pages 431-451, April.
    40. Chung, Dennis Y. & Hrazdil, Karel, 2010. "Liquidity and market efficiency: Analysis of NASDAQ firms," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 262-274.
    41. Peter Gomber & Martin Haferkorn & Kai Zimmermann, 2016. "Securities Transaction Tax and Market Quality – the Case of France," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 22(2), pages 313-337, March.
    42. Ekkehart Boehmer & Eric K. Kelley, 2009. "Institutional Investors and the Informational Efficiency of Prices," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(9), pages 3563-3594, September.
    43. Ramiah, Vikash & Xu, Xiaoming & Moosa, Imad A., 2015. "Neoclassical finance, behavioral finance and noise traders: A review and assessment of the literature," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 89-100.
    44. Dan Li & Geng Li, 2014. "Are Household Investors Noise Traders: Evidence from Belief Dispersion and Stock Trading Volume," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2014-35, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    45. Stoll, Hans R. & Whaley, Robert E., 1983. "Transaction costs and the small firm effect," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 57-79, June.
    46. Anderson, Robert M. & Eom, Kyong Shik & Hahn, Sang Buhm & Park, Jong-Ho, 2013. "Autocorrelation and partial price adjustment," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 78-93.
    47. Summers, L.H. & Summers, V.P., 1989. "When Financial Markets Work Too Well : A Cautious Case For A Securities Transactions Tax," Papers t12, Columbia - Center for Futures Markets.
    48. Daniel J. Bradley & Bradford D. Jordan & Jay R. Ritter, 2003. "The Quiet Period Goes out with a Bang," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 58(1), pages 1-36, February.
    49. Kewei Hou & Tobias J. Moskowitz, 2005. "Market Frictions, Price Delay, and the Cross-Section of Expected Returns," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 18(3), pages 981-1020.
    50. Gregory W. Brown & Michael T. Cliff, 2005. "Investor Sentiment and Asset Valuation," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 78(2), pages 405-440, March.
    51. Andrews,Donald W. K. & Stock,James H. (ed.), 2005. "Identification and Inference for Econometric Models," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521844413, October.
    52. Schmeling, Maik, 2009. "Investor sentiment and stock returns: Some international evidence," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 394-408, June.
    53. Albert Wang, F., 2010. "Informed arbitrage with speculative noise trading," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 304-313, February.
    54. Michael J. Barclay, 2003. "Price Discovery and Trading After Hours," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 16(4), pages 1041-1073.
    55. Bhushan, Ravi, 1989. "Firm characteristics and analyst following," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(2-3), pages 255-274, July.
    56. Alex Boulatov & Terrence Hendershott & Dmitry Livdan, 2013. "Informed Trading and Portfolio Returns," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 80(1), pages 35-72.
    57. Brad M. Barber & Terrance Odean, 2008. "All That Glitters: The Effect of Attention and News on the Buying Behavior of Individual and Institutional Investors," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 21(2), pages 785-818, April.
    58. Ekkehart Boehmer & Juan (Julie) Wu, 2013. "Short Selling and the Price Discovery Process," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(2), pages 287-322.
    59. De Bondt, Werner F M & Thaler, Richard H, 1987. "Further Evidence on Investor Overreaction and Stock Market Seasonalit y," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 42(3), pages 557-581, July.
    60. Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1997. "The Limits of Arbitrage," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 52(1), pages 35-55, March.
    61. Chordia, Tarun & Roll, Richard & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 2008. "Liquidity and market efficiency," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 249-268, February.
    62. Robert Bloomfield & Maureen O'Hara & Gideon Saar, 2009. "How Noise Trading Affects Markets: An Experimental Analysis," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 22(6), pages 2275-2302, June.
    63. Barclay, Michael J. & Warner, Jerold B., 1993. "Stealth trading and volatility : Which trades move prices?," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 281-305, December.
    64. Jason Greene & Scott Smart, 1999. "Liquidity Provision and Noise Trading: Evidence from the “Investment Dartboard” Column," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 54(5), pages 1885-1899, October.
    65. Brennan, Michael J. & Subrahmanyam, Avanidhar, 1995. "Investment analysis and price formation in securities markets," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 361-381, July.
    66. Roll, Richard, 1984. "A Simple Implicit Measure of the Effective Bid-Ask Spread in an Efficient Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 39(4), pages 1127-1139, September.
    67. Stiglitz, J.E., 1989. "Using Tax Policy To Curb Speculative Short-Term Trading," Papers t2, Columbia - Center for Futures Markets.
    68. Gallant, A Ronald & Rossi, Peter E & Tauchen, George, 1992. "Stock Prices and Volume," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 5(2), pages 199-242.
    69. Alok Kumar & Charles M.C. Lee, 2006. "Retail Investor Sentiment and Return Comovements," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 61(5), pages 2451-2486, October.
    70. Berkman, Henk & Eleswarapu, Venkat R., 1998. "Short-term traders and liquidity: a test using Bombay Stock Exchange data," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(3), pages 339-355, March.
    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. Zhang, Chris H. & Kalev, Petko S., 2021. "How noise trading affects informational efficiency: Evidence from an order-driven market," Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    2. Thanh Huong Nguyen, 2019. "Information and Noise in Stock Markets: Evidence on the Determinants and Effects Using New Empirical Measures," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 7-2019, January-A.
    3. Adam Zaremba & Jacob Koby Shemer, 2018. "Price-Based Investment Strategies," Springer Books, Springer, number 978-3-319-91530-2, July.
    4. Vinay Patel, 2015. "Price Discovery in US and Australian Stock and Options Markets," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 27, July-Dece.
    5. Vinay Patel, 2015. "Price Discovery in US and Australian Stock and Options Markets," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 6-2015, January-A.
    6. Jagjeev Dosanjh, 2017. "Exchange Initiatives and Market Efficiency: Evidence from the Australian Securities Exchange," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 1-2017, January-A.
    7. repec:uts:finphd:34 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Jinliang Li, 2016. "When noise trading fades, volatility rises," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 47(3), pages 475-512, October.
    9. Akbas, Ferhat & Boehmer, Ekkehart & Jiang, Chao & Koch, Paul D., 2022. "Overnight returns, daytime reversals, and future stock returns," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(3), pages 850-875.
    10. Vayanos, Dimitri & Wang, Jiang, 2013. "Market Liquidity—Theory and Empirical Evidence ," 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 1289-1361, Elsevier.
    11. Ibikunle, Gbenga & Aquilina, Matteo & Diaz-Rainey, Ivan & Sun, Yuxin, 2021. "City goes dark: Dark trading and adverse selection in aggregate markets," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 1-22.
    12. Keunbae Ahn, 2021. "Predictable Fluctuations in the Cross-Section and Time-Series of Asset Prices," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 1-2021, January-A.
    13. Ramiah, Vikash & Xu, Xiaoming & Moosa, Imad A., 2015. "Neoclassical finance, behavioral finance and noise traders: A review and assessment of the literature," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 89-100.
    14. Sayim, Mustafa & Rahman, Hamid, 2015. "An examination of U.S. institutional and individual investor sentiment effect on the Turkish stock market," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 1-17.
    15. Park, Jin Suk & Newaz, Mohammad Khaleq, 2021. "Liquidity and short-run predictability: Evidence from international stock markets," Global Finance Journal, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    16. Bohl, Martin T. & Pütz, Alexander & Sulewski, Christoph, 2021. "Speculation and the informational efficiency of commodity futures markets," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 23(C).
    17. Joel Peress & Daniel Schmidt, 2020. "Glued to the TV: Distracted Noise Traders and Stock Market Liquidity," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 75(2), pages 1083-1133, April.
    18. Rzayev, Khaladdin & Ibikunle, Gbenga, 2019. "A state-space modeling of the information content of trading volume," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 46(C).
    19. Kiran Thapa, 2013. "Stock Message Board Recommendations and Share Trading Activity," PhD Thesis, Finance Discipline Group, UTS Business School, University of Technology, Sydney, number 3-2013, January-A.
    20. Barber, Brad M. & Odean, Terrance & Zhu, Ning, 2009. "Systematic noise," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 12(4), pages 547-569, November.
    21. Stéphane Goutte & David Guerreiro & Bilel Sanhaji & Sophie Saglio & Julien Chevallier, 2019. "International Financial Markets," Post-Print halshs-02183053, HAL.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Market Microstructure; Noise trading; Informational efficiency; Regulation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G18 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Government Policy and Regulation

    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:zbw:esprep:198037. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/zbwkide.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.