Ralph S.J. Koijen† Tobias J. Moskowitz‡ Lasse Heje Pedersen§ Evert B
Carry∗ Ralph S.J. Koijen† Tobias J. Moskowitz‡ Lasse Heje Pedersen§ Evert B. Vrugt¶ August 2013 Abstract A security’s expected return can be decomposed into its “carry” and its expected price appreciation, where carry can be measured in advance without an asset pricing model. We find that carry predicts returns both in the cross section and time series for a variety of different asset classes that include global equities, global bonds, currencies, commodities, US Treasuries, credit, and equity index options. This predictability underlies the strong returns to “carry trades” that go long high- carry and short low-carry securities, applied almost exclusively to currencies, but shown here to be a robust feature of many assets. We decompose carry returns into static and dynamic components and analyze the economic exposures. Despite unconditionally low correlations across asset classes, we find times when carry strategies across all asset classes do poorly, and show that these episodes coincide with global recessions. Keywords: Carry Trade, Predictability, Stocks, Bonds, Currencies, Commodities, Corporate Bonds, Options, Global Recessions ∗First version: January 2012. We are grateful for helpful comments from Cliff Asness, Jules van Binsbergen, John Cochrane, Pierre Collin-Dufresne (discussant), Kent Daniel (discussant), Lars Hansen, John Heaton, Antti Ilmanen, Ronen Israel, Andrea Frazzini, Owen Lamont (discussant), John Liew, Francis Longstaff, Hanno Lustig (discussant), Yao Hua Ooi, Lubos Pastor, Anna Pavlova, Maik Schmeling (discussant), Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh, Dimitri Vayanos, Moto Yogo, as well as from seminar participants at AQR Capital Management, the 2012 American Finance Association Conference meetings (Chicago), Chicago Booth, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the University of Exeter, NOVA (Portugal), State Street Global Markets, the 2012 NBER Asset Pricing Summer Institute, the 1st Foreign Exchange Markets Conference - Imperial College, the 2012 Red Rock Finance Conference, and the fifth annual Paul Woolley Centre conference.
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