We provide a measure of sparsity for expected returns within the context of classical factor models. Our measure is inversely related to the percentage of active predictors. Empirically, sparsity varies over time and displays an apparent countercyclical behavior. Proxies for financial conditions...

We examine whether the predictability and business-cycle dependence of excess returns in US Treasuries can be more naturally explained in terms of state-dependent risk premia or a specific cognitive bias (representativeness). We show that the extremely parsimonious cognitive-bias model in...

We propose a new decomposition of the variance risk premium (VRP) in terms of upside and downside VRPs. These components reflect market compensation for changes in good and bad uncertainties. Empirically, we establish that the downside VRP is the main component of the VRP. We find a positive and...

We examine the connection between tail risk — as measured in Kelly and Jiang (2014) — and the cross-section of expected returns. In conditional predictive regression systems and vector-autoregressions of the market portfolio and the long- and shoresides of the Fama-French factor portfolios,...

This paper examines the properties of the variance risk premium (VRP). We propose a flexible asset pricing model that captures co-jumps in prices and volatility, and self-exciting jump clustering. We estimate the model on equity returns and variance swap rates at different horizons. The total...

In a world of interconnected financial markets it is plausible that risk appetite — an important factor in asset pricing — is determined globally. By constructing an estimate of variance risk premia (VRP) for UK, US and euro-area equity markets, we are able to estimate international variance...

Theory suggests a relationship between both volatility of volatility, variance risk premium, and the equity risk premium. We empirically investigate the relationship between volatility of volatility and the equity risk premium, and the relationship between the variance risk premium and the...

This paper reviews the predictability evidence of the variance risk premium: (1) it predicts significant positive risk premiums across equity, bond, currency, and credit markets; (2) the predictability peaks at a few month horizons and dies out afterwards; (3) such a short-run predictability is...

This paper investigates the role of volatility risk on stock return predictability specified on two global financial crises: the dot-com bubble and recent financial crisis. Using a broad sample of stock options traded at the American Stock Exchange and the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE)...

A growing body of literature analyses the impact of news on companies' equity prices. We add to this literature by showing that the transmission channel of news to prices differs across sectors. First, we disentangle sectoral equity prices into components of expected future earnings and equity...