Market reactions to changes in the Dow Jones industrial average index

Ernest N. Biktimirov and Yuanbin Xu

International Journal of Managerial Finance, 2019, vol. 15, issue 5, 792-812

Abstract: Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to examine changes in stock returns, liquidity, institutional ownership, analyst following and investor awareness for companies added to and deleted from the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) index. Previous studies report conflicting evidence regarding the market reactions to changes in the DJIA index membership. Design/methodology/approach - This study uses the event-study methodology to calculate abnormal returns and trading volume around the announcement and effective days of DJIA index changes from 1929 to 2015. It also tests for significant changes in liquidity, institutional ownership, analyst following and investor awareness in the 1990–2015 period. Multivariate regressions are used to perform a simultaneous analysis of competing hypotheses. Findings - This study resolves the mixed results of previous DJIA index papers by documenting different stock price and trading volume reactions over the 1929–2015 period. Focusing on the most recent period, 1990–2015, the study finds that stocks added to (deleted from) the index experience a significant permanent stock price gain (loss). The observed stock price reaction seems to be associated with changes in liquidity proxies thus lending support for the liquidity hypothesis. Research limitations/implications - Limited data availability for the periods prior to 1990 prevents this study from identifying the exact reasons for different stock price and trading volume reactions across subperiods of the 1929–2015 period. Originality/value - This study provides the most comprehensive examination of market reactions to changes in the DJIA index and resolves the mixed results of previous studies. A better understanding of market reactions around the DJIA index changes can help both individual and institutional investors with developing effective trading strategies and index managing companies with designing optimal announcement policies.

Keywords: Stock prices; Abnormal return; Liquidity; Event study; Index changes; Dow Jones industrial average index (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (text/html)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:ijmfpp:ijmf-10-2017-0226

DOI: 10.1108/IJMF-10-2017-0226

Access Statistics for this article

International Journal of Managerial Finance is currently edited by Dr Alfred Yawson

More articles in International Journal of Managerial Finance from Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Emerald Support ().