Stock Return Seasonalities and Investor Structure: Evidence from China’s B-Share Markets

Abstract

This paper investigates whether seasonalities in daily stock returns are related to the trading behavior of individual and institutional investors. The change in the investor structure of B-share markets in Shanghai and Shenzhen after the abolition of ownership restrictions in 2001 provides a unique testing environ- ment. We show that day-of-the-week eects are attenuated after the market entrance of Chinese individual investors who had previously not been allowed to trade in B-shares. Our empirical results suggest that institutional rather than individual investors are a main driving force behind such anomalies. In addi- tion, we nd evidence of reduced index return autocorrelation and US spillover eects in the post-liberalization period.Institutional Investors, Individual Investors, Stock Return Seasonalities, Chinese Stock Markets, GARCH Model