Price impact of block trades: the curious case of downstairs trading in the EU emissions futures market

Gbenga Ibikunle, Andros Gregoriou and Naresh R. Pandit

The European Journal of Finance, 2016, vol. 22, issue 2, 120-142

Abstract: Using high-frequency data from the European Climate Exchange (ECX), we examine the determinants of price impact of €21 billion worth of block trades during 2008-2011 in the European carbon market. We find that wider bid-ask spreads and volatility are characterised by a smaller price impact. Larger levels of price impact are more likely to occur during the middle of the trading day, specifically the four-hour period between 11 a.m. and 3 p.m., than during the first or final hours. Purchase block trades induce a relatively smaller price impact on price run-up, while sell block trades exhibit a larger price impact on price run-up. We conclude that block trades on the ECX induce less price impact than in equity or conventional futures markets, and that a significant proportion of the effects contradict findings on block trades in those markets; thus, we provide the first evidence of the curious bent to block trading in the European Union emissions trading scheme.

Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/1351847X.2014.935871 (text/html)
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:taf:eurjfi:v:22:y:2016:i:2:p:120-142

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/REJF20

DOI: 10.1080/1351847X.2014.935871

Access Statistics for this article

The European Journal of Finance is currently edited by Chris Adcock

More articles in The European Journal of Finance from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().