Research and publications

Low-Cost Momentum Strategies

The article analyses the impact of trading costs on the profitability of momentum strategies in the UK and concludes that losers are more expensive to trade than winners. The observed asymmetry in the costs of trading winners and losers crucially relates to the high cost of selling loser stocks with small size and low trading volume. Since transaction costs severely impact net momentum profits, the paper defines a new low-cost relative-strength strategy by shortlisting from all winner and loser stocks those with the lowest total transaction costs. A revisited version of this paper was published in the February 2009 issue of the Journal of Asset Management.

Author(s):

Xiafei Li, Chris Brooks, Joëlle Miffre

Summary:

The article analyses the impact of trading costs on the profitability of momentum strategies in the UK and concludes that losers are more expensive to trade than winners. The observed asymmetry in the costs of trading winners and losers crucially relates to the high cost of selling loser stocks with small size and low trading volume. Since transaction costs severely impact net momentum profits, the paper defines a new low-cost relative-strength strategy by shortlisting from all winner and loser stocks those with the lowest total transaction costs. A revisited version of this paper was published in the February 2009 issue of the Journal of Asset Management.

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Type :	Working paper
Date :	05/05/2008
Keywords :	Performance Measurement

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