Stock return reversal and continuance anomaly: new evidence from Hong Kong

Abstract

Using weekly data, this article conducts a comprehensive analysis and presents new empirical evidences on the short-term stock return reversal and continuance anomaly in the Hong Kong stock market. We confirm that winner stocks behave differently from loser stocks in that the return reversal phenomenon is pervasive within past winner stocks only while past loser stocks tend to show weak return continuance. The arbitrage strategy can earn significantly positive contrarian profits, especially for small firms and illiquid stocks. The anomaly varies across different industries and is also sensitive to the market movement. Despite the existence of the anomaly, our results still in general suggest that the Hong Kong stock market is weak-form efficient because arbitrage trading costs would largely overwhelm the available profits in most cases.

Keywords:

• stock returns
• return reversal
• return continuance
• return anomaly
• market efficiency

JEL Classification:

• G10
• G14

Acknowledgement

The authors thank the valuable comments from an anonymous referee on an earlier version of this article. Useful suggestions are also acknowledged through various discussions with colleagues from Hong Kong Baptist University.