Using a new daily index of social unrest, we provide systematic evidence on the negative impact of social unrest on stock market performance. An average social unrest episode in an typical country causes a 1.4 percentage point drop in cumulative abnormal returns over a two-week event window....

Due to the high importance of the American economy, in the past, announcements of US macroeconomic data were shown to have a significant impact on financial markets in general, and on European stock markets in particular. However, as this effect may vary in time, this paper examines the changes...