This paper considers the task of forming a portfolio of assets that outperforms a benchmark index, while imposing a constraint on the tracking error volatility. We examine three alternative formulations of active portfolio management. The first one is a typical setup in which the fund manager...

The proposition that idiosyncratic volatility may matter in asset pricing is currently a topic of research and controversy. Using data from the UK market we examine the predictive ability of various measures of idiosyncratic risk and provide evidence which suggests that: (a) it is the...

The evidence on the inter-temporal relation between idiosyncratic risk and future stock returns is conflicting and confusing. We shed new light on the issue using a more flexible econometric approach based on [Hamilton, J.D. 1989. A new approach to the economic analysis of nonstationary time...

"We analyse the components of the bid-ask spread in the Athens Stock Exchange (ASE), which was recently characterised as a developed market. For large and medium capitalisation stocks, we estimate the adverse selection and the order handling component of the spreads as well as the probability of...

This paper analyses the properties of idiosyncratic risk in the Greek Stock Market by disaggregating the total volatility of stocks at market, industry, and firm level. Idiosyncratic risk is much larger and represents a smaller component of total volatility in Greece compared with other...

Purpose – The aim is to evaluate the performance of symmetric and asymmetric ARCH models in forecasting both the one‐day‐ahead Value‐at‐Risk (VaR) and the realized intra‐day volatility of two equity indices in the Athens Stock Exchange. Design/methodology/approach – Two volatility...

Mutual fund manager excess performance should be measured relative to their self-reported benchmark rather than the return of a passive portfolio with the same risk characteristics. Ignoring the self-reported benchmark introduces biases in the measurement of stock selection and timing components...

This article examines if idiosyncratic risk can forecast stock returns for 10 European markets. We found little evidence to suggest that idiosyncratic volatility, equally or value weighted, can predict future stock market returns. However, we found that idiosyncratic risk measured as the equally...

We evaluate the performance of an extensive family of ARCH models in modelling daily Value-at-Risk (VaR) of perfectly diversified portfolios in five stock indices, using a number of distributional assumptions and sample sizes. We find, first, that leptokurtic distributions are able to produce...

Greek public pension funds can invest up to 23% into risky assets and are not allowed to invest outside Greece. This paper seeks to investigate the costs of investment constraints on pension fund portfolios. In particular we try to quantify the losses that portfolios suffer due to...