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The paper tries to analyse empirically the impact of India's economic policy uncertainty (EPU) index on different macro-economic variables of India, like import, export, interest rate, exchange rate, inflation rate and stock market during pre-COVID-19 and COVID-19 era.

Although there exist several works where relationship and volatility among the stock markets and macro-economic indicators during the COVID-19 pandemic have been estimated, but till now none of the studies examined the effect of EPU index on different macro-economic variables in the Indian context along with the stock market due to the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic. This is considered a noteworthy gap and hence opens up a new dimension for examination. To get a clear picture, monthly data from January, 2012 to September, 2021 have been considered where January, 2012–February, 2020 is taken as the pre-COVID-19 period and March, 2020–September, 2021 as COVID-19 period. All the data are converted into log natural. The authors applied DCC-GARCH model to investigate the impact of EPU index on volatility of selected variables over the study period across a multivariate framework and Markov regime-switching model to examine the switching over of the variables.

The results of dynamic conditional correlation - multivariate generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (DCC-MGARCH) model indicates the presence of volatility in the dependent variables arising out of economic policy uncertainty considering the segmentation of the study period into pre-COVID-19 and COVID-19. The results of Markov regime-switching model show the variables make a significant move from low-volatility regime to high-volatility regime due to the presence of COVID-19.

It can be implied that impact of EPU in terms of volatility on the Indian Stock Market will lead to unfavourable investment conditions for the prospective investors. Even, the different macro-economic variables are to suffer from the volatility arising out of EPU across a long time horizon as confirmed from the DCC-MGARCH model.

The study is original in nature. It adds superior values from the new and significant findings from the study empirically. Application of DCC-MGARCH model and Markov regime switching model makes the study an innovative one in terms of methodology and findings.

This present work aims at looking into whether or not introducing commodities in international equity portfolios helps reduce the market risk and if hedging is carried out with the same effectiveness across different regional stock markets.

The authors determine the optimal hedge ratios and hedging effectiveness of a number of commodity-hedged emerging and developed equity markets, using three versions of MGARCH model: DCC, ADCC and GO-GARCH. The authors also use a rolling window estimation procedure for the purpose of constructing out-of-sample one-step-ahead forecasts of dynamic conditional correlations and optimal hedge ratios.

Empirical results evince that commodities significantly display effective risk-reducing hedge instruments in short and long runs. The main finding is that commodities do not seem to hedge regional stock markets in the same way. They tend to provide evidence of a rather effective hedging regarding mainly the East European and Latin American stock markets.

The authors study whether commodities can hedge stock markets at regional context and if hedging effectiveness differ from one region to another.

This study aims to measure the degree of volatility comovement between stock market liquidity and informational efficiency across Asia, Europe, North-South America, Africa, and the Pacific Ocean over three decades. In particular, the authors analyze the extent of the time-varying nexus between different aspects of stock market liquidity and multifractal scaling properties of the stock return series across various regions and diversified market conditions. This study further investigates several factors altering the degree of dynamic conditional correlations (DCCs) between the efficiency and liquidity of the domestic stock markets.

The study measures five aspects of stock market liquidity – tightness, depth, breadth, immediacy, and adjusted immediacy. The authors evaluate the multifractal scaling properties of the stock return series to measure the level of stock market efficiency across the regions and diversified market conditions. The study uses the dynamic conditional correlation-multivariate generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity framework to quantify the degree of volatility comovement between liquidity and efficiency over the period.

The study finds the presence of stronger volatility comovement between inefficiency and illiquidity due to the price impact characteristics of the stock markets irrespective of different regions and diversified market conditions. The extent of time-variation increased following the shock periods, indicating the significant role of the financial crisis in increasing the volatility comovement between inefficiency and illiquidity. The highest degree of time-varying correlation is observed in the developed stock markets of Northwestern and Northern Europe compared to the regional and emerging counterparts. On the other hand, weak DCCs are observed in the emerging stock markets of Europe.

The output of the present study assists investors in identifying diversification opportunities across the regions. Additionally, the study has significant implications for market regulators, aiding in predicting future troughs and peaks. The prediction, in turn, helps formulate capital market development plans during dynamic economic situations.

This paper aims to investigate the immediate effect of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic by investigating volatility transmission and dynamic correlation between stock (conventional and Islamic) markets, bitcoin and major commodities such as gold, oil and silver at different investment horizons before and after 161 trading days of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The MGARCH-DCC and maximum overlap discrete wavelet transform -based cross-correlation were used in the estimation of the volatility spillover and continuous wavelet transform in the estimation of the time-varying volatility and correlation between the assets at different investment horizons.

The authors observed a sudden correlation breakdown following the COVID-19 shock. Oil (Bitcoin) was a major volatility transmitter before (during) COVID-19. Digital gold (Bitcoin), gold and silver became highly correlated during COVID-19. The highest co-movement between the assets was observed at medium and long-term investment horizons.

The study findings have a financial implication for day traders, investors and policymakers in the understanding of volatility transmission and intercorrelation in a bid to actively manage stylized and well-diversified asset portfolios.

This study is unique for its employment in estimating the time-varying conditional volatility of the investable assets and cross-correlations between them at different investment horizons, particularly before and after COVID-19 outbreak.

The aim of the paper is to investigate the risk-hedging and/or safe haven properties of environmental, social and governance (ESG) index during the COVID-19 in China.

This paper employs the DCC, VCC, CCC as well as Newey–West estimator regression.

The findings provide empirical evidence of the risk hedging properties of ESG indexes as well as of the environmental, social and governance thematic indexes during the outbreak of the COVID-19 crisis. The results also support the superior risk hedging properties of ESG indexes over cryptocurrency. However, the authors do not find any safe haven properties of ESG, Bitcoin, gold and West Texas Intermediate (WTI).

The paper offers therefore, practical policy implications for asset managers, central bankers and investors suggesting the pandemic risk-hedging opportunities of ESG investments.

The study represents one of the first empirical contributions examining safe-haven and hedging properties of ESG indexes compared to traditional and innovative safe haven assets, during the eruption of the COVID-19 crisis.

This study aims to test the contagion effect of the Tunisian revolution on the Egyptian stock market. Thus, the purpose of this research is to distinguish the contagion effect from the simple interdependence between these markets.

This paper examines the contagion hypothesis between Tunisia and Egypt during the Arab Spring, using a DCC-MGARCH model to capture time-varying contagion effects and dynamic linkages in stock markets. Therefore, to identify the contagion effect from the simple interdependence, the authors apply the pure contagion test developed by Forbes and Rigobon (2002).

The findings indicate a contagion effect, as the EGX 30 index exhibited similar changes, positive or negative, as the Tunindex index during the period of the Tunisian revolution. Moreover, the analysis demonstrates the presence of an interdependence between the Tunisian revolution and the Egyptian market, emphasizing the interconnections between these two economies.

The findings provide investors with a better understanding of financial market dynamics in times of major political unrest, notably on the Tunisian and Egyptian markets. By understanding the contagion effect of the Tunisian revolution on the Egyptian stock market, investors can further explore the complexities of these markets in times of financial crises, which can help mitigate losses and identify strategic investment opportunities.

This study makes two significant contributions to the field. First, it addresses the scarcity of research specifically focused on the contagion effect during the Arab Spring, aiming to fill this gap by testing the contagion effect of the Tunisian revolution on a nearby market. Second, it extends the contagion test of Forbes and Rigobon (2002), which associates “pure” contagion with a significantly higher correlation between markets during a crisis.

This study aims to investigate the conditional volatility of the Asian stock market concerning Bitcoin and global crude oil price movement.

This study uses the newest Dynamic Conditional Correlation (DCC)-Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity (GARCH) model to examine the conditional volatility of the stock market for Bitcoin and crude oil prices in the Asian perspective. The sample stock market includes Chinese, Indian, Japanese, Malaysian, Pakistani, Singaporean, South Korean and Turkish stock exchanges, with daily time series data ranging from 4 April 2015−31 July 2023.

The outcome reveals the presence of volatility clustering on the return series of crude oil, Bitcoin and all selected stock exchanges of the current study. Secondly, the outcome of DCC, manifests that there is no short-run volatility spillover from crude oil to the Malaysian, Pakistani and South Korean and Turkish stock markets, whereas Chinese, Indian, Japanese, Singapore stock exchanges show the short-run volatility spillover from crude oil in the short run. On the other hand, in the long run, there is a volatility spillover effect from crude oil to all the stock exchanges. Thirdly, the findings suggest that there is no immediate spillover of volatility from Bitcoin to the stock markets return volatility of China, India, Malaysia, Pakistan, South Korea and Singapore. In contrast, both the Japanese and Turkish stock exchanges exhibit a short-term volatility spillover from Bitcoin. In the long term, a volatility spillover effect from Bitcoin is observed in all stock exchanges except for Malaysia. Lastly, based on the outcome of conditional variance, it can be concluded that there was increase in the return volatility of stock exchanges during the period of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The analysis below does not account for the bias induced due to certain small sample properties of DCC-GARCH model. There exists a huge literature that suggests other methodologies for small sample corrections such as the DCC connectedness approach. On the other hand, decisive corollaries of the conclusions drawn above have been made purely based on a comprehensive investigation of eight Asian stock exchange economies. However, there is scope for inclusive examination by considering other Nordic and Western financial markets with panel data approach to get more robust inferences about the reality.

Most of the empirical analysis in this perspective skewed towards the Nordic and Western countries. In addition to that many empirical investigations examine either the impact of crude oil price movement or Bitcoin performance on the stock market return volatility. However, none of the examinations quests the crude oil and Bitcoin together to unearth their implication on the stock market return volatility in a single study, especially in the Asian context. Hence, current investigation endeavours to examine the ramifications of Bitcoin and crude oil price movement on the stock market return volatility from an Asian perspective, which has significant implications for the investors of the Asian financial market.

This paper aims to deepen the understanding of the relationship between global economic uncertainty and price volatility, specifically focusing on commodity, industrial materials and energy price indices as proxies for global inflation, analyzing data from 1997 to 2020.

The dynamic conditional correlation generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity model is used to study the dynamic relationship between variables over a while.

The results demonstrated a positive relationship between commodity prices and the global economic policy uncertainty (GEPU). Except for 1999–2000 and 2006–2008, the results of the energy price index model were very similar to those of the commodity price index. A predominant positive relationship is observed focusing on the connection between GEPU and the industrial material price index. The results of the pairwise Granger causality reveal a unidirectional relationship between the GEPU – the Global Commodity Price Index – and the GEPU – the Global Industrial Material Price Index. However, there is bidirectional causality between the GEPU – the Global Energy Price Index. In sum, changes in price indices can be driven by GEPU as a political factor indicating unfavorable economic conditions.

This paper provides a deeper understanding of the role of global uncertainty in the global inflation process. It fills the gap in the literature by empirically investigating the dynamic movements of global uncertainty and the three most important groups of prices.

The aim of this study is to examine the nature and determinants of stock market integration between India and other Asia–Pacific countries (Malaysia, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Japan, China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Taiwan) over the period 1991–2021.

Unit root tests, the dynamic conditional correlation-Glosten Jagannathan and Runkle-generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity (DCC-GJR-GARCH), pooled ordinary least squares (OLS) regression and random effects models are employed for the analysis.

The empirical results show that the DCC between each pair of sample countries is less than 0.5, indicating weak ties between the pairs of sample countries. Also, the DCC between India and other Asia–Pacific stock markets is positive and low, implying low level of integration. The correlation between India and China stock markets is found to be the highest, implying significant level of integration. The main reason for it would be strong economic linkages and bilateral trade relationship between India and China. Moreover, gross domestic product (GDP), interest rate (IR), consumer price index (CPI)-inflation and money supply (MS) differentials are the major driver of stock market integration between India and other Asia–Pacific countries.

The findings of the study have important implications for investors, portfolio managers and policymakers. It is found that the DCC between India and other Asia–Pacific countries (considered in the study) except China is low, which indicates weak ties between the pairs of sample countries. This implies that the Indian stock market provides good investment opportunities for foreign investors. Also, investors and portfolio managers can attain more diversified benefits and can minimize country risk by investing across Asia–Pacific countries. Further, knowledge about the factors that integrate the Indian stock market with the other Asia–Pacific stock markets will help policymakers frame suitable economic and financial stabilization policies.

This study contributes to the extant literature: first, by examining the linkages of Indian stock market with other Asia–Pacific countries; second, although previous studies confirmed the existence of linkages among the various stock markets, few researchers pay attention to the factors driving the process of stock market integration. This study provides additional evidence by examining the significant macroeconomic factors driving the process of such integration in the Asia–Pacific region considered under the study.

This study unravels an attempt to investigate the dynamic connectedness of agri-commodity (wheat) of Russia with 10 financial markets of wheat importing counties during the Russia–Ukraine invasion.

This study took the daily prices of Wheat FOB Black Sea Index (Russia) along with stock indices of 10 major wheat-importing nations of Russia and Ukraine. The time frame for this study ranges from February 24, 2022 to July 31, 2022. This time frame was selected since it fully examines all of the effects of the crisis. The conditional correlations and volatility spillovers of these indices are predicted using the DCC-GARCH model, Diebold and Yilmaz (2012) and Baruník and Křehlík (2018) models.

It is found that there is dynamic linkage of agri-commodity of with stock markets of Iraq, Pakistan and Tanzania in short run while stock markets of Egypt, Turkey, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Brazil and Iraq are spilled by agri-commodity in long run. In addition, it documents that there is large spillover in short run than medium and long run comparatively. This signifies that investors have more diversification opportunity in short run then long run contemplating to invest in these markets.

To the best of the authors’ understanding this is the first study to undertake the dynamic linkage of agri-commodity (wheat) of Russia with financial market of select importing counties during the Russia–Ukraine invasion.