Impacts of Macroeconomic News Announcements on Corporate Bond Market

Abstract

This chapter examines the impacts of scheduled announcements of 14 widely followed macroeconomic news on the corporate bond market from July 2002 to June 2017 and documents several new findings. First, good (bad) macroeconomic news tends to have a negative (positive) effect on IG bond returns and a positive (negative) effect on high-yield (HY) bond returns. Second, nonfarm payroll (NFP) appears to be the “King of announcements” for the corporate bond market. Third, while information about revisions of prior releases is incorporated into bond prices on announcement days, future revisions fail to be priced in. Fourth, the news information is thoroughly and quickly reflected in bond prices on the announcement day. Finally, corporate bond volatility increases on announcement days, whereas the Zero Lower Bound (ZLB) policy has little effect on conditional volatility.

Citation

Jiang, R., Wang, B., Wu, C. and Zhang, Y. (2023), "Impacts of Macroeconomic News Announcements on Corporate Bond Market", Lee, C.-F. and Yu, M.-T. (Ed.) Advances in Pacific Basin Business, Economics and Finance (Advances in Pacific Basin Business, Economics and Finance, Vol. 11), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 89-125. https://doi.org/10.1108/S2514-465020230000011005