Search Results
Working Paper
Biased Shorts: Short sellers’ Disposition Effect and Limits to Arbitrage
We investigate whether short sellers are subject to the disposition effect using a novel dataset that allows to identify the closing of short positions. Consistent with the disposition effect, short sellers are more likely to close a position the higher their capital gains. Furthermore, stocks with high short sale capital gains experience negative returns, suggesting that their disposition effect has an effect on stock prices. A trading strategy based on this finding achieves significant three-factor alphas. Overall, short sellers? behavioral biases limit their ability to arbitrage away the ...
Working Paper
Peer Pressure: Social Interaction and the Disposition Effect
Social interaction contributes to some traders? disposition effect. New data from an investment-specific social network linked to individual-level trading records builds evidence of this connection. To credibly estimate causal peer effects, I exploit the staggered entry of retail brokerages into partnerships with the social trading web platform and compare trader activity before and after exposure to these new social conditions. Access to the social network nearly doubles the magnitude of a trader?s disposition effect. Traders connected in the network develop correlated levels of the ...