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Working Paper
Publication Bias and the Cross-Section of Stock Returns
We develop an estimator for publication bias and apply it to 156 hedge portfolios based on published cross-sectional return predictors. Publication bias adjusted returns are only 12% smaller than in-sample returns. The small bias comes from the dispersion of returns across predictors, which is too large to be accounted for by data-mined noise. Among predictors that can survive journal review, a low t-stat hurdle of 1.8 controls for multiple testing using statistics recommended by Harvey, Liu, and Zhu (2015). The estimated bias is too small to account for the deterioration in returns after ...
Working Paper
Zeroing in on the Expected Returns of Anomalies
We zero in on the expected returns of long-short portfolios based on 120 stock market anomalies by accounting for (1) effective bid-ask spreads, (2) post-publication effects, and (3) the modern era of trading technology that began in the early 2000s. Net of these effects, the average anomaly's expected return is a measly 8 bps per month. The strongest anomalies return only 10-20 bps after accounting for data-mining with either out-of-sample tests or empirical Bayesian methods. Expected returns are negligible despite cost optimizations that produce impressive net returns in-sample and the ...