The 2008 Short Sale Ban: Liquidity, Dispersion of Opinion, and the Cross-Section of Returns of U.S. Financial Stocks
41 Pages Posted: 23 Jun 2009 Last revised: 5 Dec 2012
Date Written: January 19, 2011
Abstract
This study examines the cross-sectional impact of the 2008 short sale ban on the returns of U.S. financial stocks. Motivated by the large cross-sectional variation in the extent to which banned stocks suffer an illiquidity shock, we hypothesize that stocks with larger liquidity declines are associated with poorer contemporaneous stock returns. The evidence supports this hypothesis and suggests that this effect is stronger for more liquid stocks, as predicted by Amihud and Mendelson (1986). Moreover, consistent with Miller’s (1977) model, we report a valuation reversal whereby stocks with higher abnormal returns at the onset of the ban have lower abnormal returns at its removal. Our findings are robust when we control for firms most affected by TARP, include non-banned matched firms, and compare banned firms’ stock returns with their bond returns. From a policy standpoint, the ban reduced valuations, ceteris paribus, of the stocks that were hardest hit by illiquidity.
Keywords: Short sale ban, Liquidity, Dispersion of opinion
JEL Classification: G12, G14, G18, G28
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
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