The Effects of Option Trading Behavior on Option Prices

Han-Sheng Chen and Sanjiv Sabherwal ()
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Han-Sheng Chen: Department of Accounting, Finance, and Economics, Lipscomb University, 1 University Park Dr, Nashville, TN 37204, USA
Sanjiv Sabherwal: Department of Finance & Real Estate, University of Texas at Arlington, 701 S. West Street, Arlington, TX 76019, USA

JRFM, 2023, vol. 16, issue 7, 1-24

Abstract: This paper investigates the relationship between option trading behavior and option pricing patterns. We argue that greater active trading in the options market due to investor overconfidence leads to higher volatility and larger discrepancies in option pricing, which may be captured by implied volatility spread and implied volatility skewness. Using two different measures of excess option trading, we find that trading activities are correlated in different ways with volatility, volatility spread, and volatility skewness. We also find that these relationships exist both over time and cross-sectionally. We suggest that options investors tend to chase “hot” stocks, as we find evidence of a positive relationship between option trading activities and past underlying equity returns. Heavier trading in the options market also tends to make out-of-the-money call options more (less) expensive than the at-the-money counterparts over time (cross-sectionally). Because trading activities do not predict future equity returns, investor overconfidence, and not informed trading, seems to be a more plausible explanation for our findings.

Keywords: overconfidence; options market; option turnover; volatility spread; volatility smirk; behavioral finance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C E F2 F3 G (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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