M.B.A / The aim of this dissertation is to determine if there is any evidence that supports a "50" and a "200" day moving average share trading strategy to select, buy and sell shares quoted on the Johannesburg Securities Exchange (JSE) Main Board, in order to determine if a "50" and a "200" day moving average share trading strategy will be appropriate to use, in order to make share trading profits in excess of the return generated by the JSE Overall Index. 1.4 0 .ACTIFVES o To evaluate fundamental analysis in respect of the quality of information (mainly at a company level) available to investors as the basis on which decisions to buy and sell shares are made. o To evaluate previous research undertaken in technical analysis with respect to the use and application of moving averages as a trading strategy in making share selections as well as buy and sell decisions. 14 Analyse historic price data on individual, randomly selected shares from the total population of all main board (1.6.5) listed shares quoted on the Johannesburg

This study investigates the independence assumption of the theory of random walks in stock market prices through the simulation of the moving average strategy. In the process of doing so, three related questions are examined: (1) Does the past relative volatility of a stock furnish a useful indication of its future behavior? (2) Is the performance of the decision rule improved by applying it to those securities which are likely to be highly volatile? (3) Does positive dependence in successive monthly price changes exist? The purpose of Test No. 1 was to gauge the tendency for a stock's relative volatility to remain constant over two adjacent intervals of time. As measured by the coefficient of variation, the volatility of each of the 200 securities was computed over the 1936 to 1945 and 1946 to 1955 decades. In order to evaluate the strength of the relationship between these paired observations, a rank correlation analysis was performed. The results indicated a substantial difference in relative volatility for each security over the two ten-year periods. In Test No. 2 a different experimental design was employed to determine whether the relative volatility of a stock tended to remain within a definite range over time. According to their volatility in the 1936 to 1945 period, the 200 securities were divided into ten groups. Portfolio No. 1 contained the twenty most volatile securities while Portfolio No. 2 consisted of the next twenty most volatile, etc. An average coefficient of variation was calculated for each group over the periods, 1936 to 1945 and 1946 to 1955. The rank correlation analysis on these ten paired observations revealed that the most volatile securities, as a group, tended to remain the most volatile. Test No. 3 consisted of the application of the moving average strategy (for long positions only) to forty series of month-end prices covering the interval, 1956 to 1966. These securities had demonstrated a high relative volatility over the previous decade and, on the basis of the findings reported in Test No. 2, it was forecasted that they would be the most volatile of the sample of 200 in the period under investigation. Four different moving averages ranging from three to six months, and thirteen different thresholds ranging from 2 to 50 per cent were simulated. The results of the simulation showed the moving average strategy to be much inferior to the two buy-and-hold models. Every threshold regardless of the length of the moving average yielded a negative return. In addition, the losses per threshold were spread throughout the majority of stocks. Altogether, therefore, considerable evidence was found in favour of the random walk theory of stock price behavior. / Business, Sauder School of / Graduate

published_or_final_version / Business Administration / Master / Master of Business Administration

by Leung Kwok Chu, Wong Cheuk Fung. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 54-55). / ABSTRACT --- p.ii / TABLE OF CONTENTS --- p.iv / ACKNOWLEDGMENTS --- p.vi / Chapter / Chapter I. --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Technical Analysis --- p.2 / The Characteristics and Efficiency of China's Equity Markets --- p.3 / Market Participants --- p.4 / Transaction Costs and Tradability of Shares --- p.5 / Availability of Information --- p.7 / Implication on Weak Form Market Efficiency --- p.8 / Relative Strength Index --- p.10 / Chapter II. --- LITERATURE REVIEW --- p.12 / Chapter III. --- METHODOLOGY --- p.15 / Primary Research --- p.15 / Source of Data --- p.15 / Spreadsheet Calculation Procedure --- p.16 / Hypothesis Testing --- p.18 / The First Type of Tests --- p.18 / The Second Type of Tests --- p.19 / The Third Type of Tests --- p.20 / Chapter IV. --- RESEARCH FINDINGS --- p.21 / Abnormal Returns Obtained by Following RSI Trading Rules --- p.21 / A-shares --- p.21 / Buy signals --- p.21 / Interpretations of buy signals in A-share markets --- p.22 / Sell signals --- p.22 / Interpretations of sell signals in A-share markets --- p.23 / B-shares --- p.25 / Buy signals --- p.25 / Interpretations of buy signals in B-share markets --- p.25 / Sell signals --- p.26 / Interpretations of sell signals in B-share markets --- p.27 / Chapter V. --- ADDITIONAL RESEARCHES ON B-SHARE MARKETS --- p.30 / Findings on Additional Researches on B-share Markets --- p.30 / Interpretations of Findings on Additional Researches on B-share Markets --- p.31 / Chapter VI. --- ADDITIONAL RESEARCHES ON A-SHARE MARKETS --- p.32 / Correlation between Abnormal Return and Volume Turnover --- p.33 / Findings on Correlation between Abnormal Return and Volume Turnover --- p.33 / Interpretations of Findings on Correlation between Abnormal Return and Volume Turnover --- p.33 / Correlation between Abnormal Return and Market Value --- p.34 / Findings on Correlation between Abnormal Return and Market Value --- p.34 / Interpretations of Findings on Correlation between Abnormal Return and Market Value --- p.35 / Chapter VII. --- CONCLUSIONS --- p.37 / Chapter VIII. --- LIMITATIONS --- p.39 / Chapter IX. --- FURTHER STUDIES RECOMMENDED --- p.42 / APPENDIX --- p.44 / BIBLIOGRAPHY --- p.54

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Economics and Finance / Master / Master of Economics

Forecasting volatility with precision in financial market is very important. This paper examines the use of various forms of GARCH models for forecasting volatility. Three financial data sets from Japan (NIKKEI 225 index), the United States (Standard & Poor 500) and Germany (DAX index) are considered. A number of GARCH models, such as EGARCH, IGARCH, TGARCH, PGARCH and QGARCH models with normal distribution and student’s t distribution are used to fit the data sets and to forecast volatility. The Maximum Likelihood method and the Bayesian approach are used to estimate the parameters in the family of the GARCH models. The results show that the QGARCH model under student’s t distribution is the precise model for the NIKKEI 225 index in terms of fitting the data and forecasting volatility. The TGARCH under the student’s t distribution fits the S&P 500 index data better while the traditional GARCH model under the same distribution performs better in forecasting volatility. The PGARCH with student’s t distribution is the precise model for the DAX index in terms of fitting the data and forecasting volatility. / Department of Mathematical Sciences

published_or_final_version / Economics and Finance / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The purpose of this study is to investigate the daily return behavior of underlying common stocks in the period surrounding the option expiration date. A second purpose is to determine the variables that may be causing the differential capital market effect across firms. The hypothesis of a negative return effect in the expiration week followed by a positive effect in the subsequent week is tested first. It is shown that this pattern should be expected due to the enhanced opportunity for and profitability of position unwinding, arbitrage and manipulation activity as the expiration date approached. The study period covers 32 expiration periods from 1978 through 1981 and involves a sample of 138 underlying stocks. The study employs the market model for generating abnormal returns on a daily basis. The results support the hypothesis and in particular show that the most significant negative return behavior occurs on Thursday and Friday of the expiration week. The second phase of the study correlates, via a cross-sectional multiple regression model, the suggested expiration induced events of position unwinding, arbitrage and manipulation activities with the return behavior of the underlying stocks. It is hypothesized that those common stocks which exhibit the greatest negative returns in the expiration week are those stocks and related call options that are most heavily involved in position unwinding, arbitrage and manipulation activities. Trading volume in both the underlying stock and the options is suggested as a surrogate for these three activities. Therefore, volume is negatively related to underlying stock returns. Two additional explanatory variables of the expiration week returns are included in the regression model. A negative relationship is hypothesized if options are dually listed and a positive relationship if puts are traded. The results of the tests generally support these hypothesized functional relationships. The study concludes that, although significant abnormal returns and explanatory variables are found, the magnitudes are probably not large enough to profitably exploit after paying transaction and search costs. As puts trading appears to offset the market inefficiencies caused by call option trading, the concern of regulators that options trading unduly affects stock prices seems unwarranted.

A research report submitted to the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, In partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Management (Finance and Investment Management), 2016 / The relationship between real economic activity and stock market performance is one that has been extensively researched throughout many decades, across many economies. Many issues and debates have stemmed involving this relationship, with the major ones including those of the significance of the relationship, nature of the relationship as well as causality and direction of causality within the relationship. This research paper examines this relationship within the South African context, comparing the pre and post 2008 global financial crisis periods. Results both in support of and contrary to theory were found as real economic activity had an immediate postitive response to shocks imposed on the stock index, whilst the stock index had an immediate negative response to shocks imposed on real economic activity. Through the use of granger causality testing, no causality was found in either direction. Furthermore, no major differences were noted between the pre and post crisis periods. / GR2018

Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Masters of Management in Finance and Investments (MMFI) in the Graduate School of Business Administration University of the Witwatersrand 2017. / The Western Cape Fishing industry has been a subject of discussion in numerous papers, in which the thrust has been to seek ways of sustaining the significantly fluctuating business. Common risk factors have been identified and strategies for managing the fishing business in turbulent periods have been proposed over the years. A closer examination of previous literature as well as empirical evidence indicate that the business has less to do to control or minimize the impact of most of its external factors, which include the Government imposed Total Allowable Catch (TAC) limit, the variability in natural marine populations, environmental factors and fuel price oscillations. In the interest of curbing the variability component which is borne by the internal factors, this study brings on board a quantitative dimension to the evaluation of the four commonly cited internal factors, namely; Earnings Per Share (EPS), Margin of Safety (MOS), Free Cash-Flow (FCF) and the Net-Worth (NW) on volatility of the fishing business. The performance of five large JSE-listed fishing firms: Brimstone, Oceana, Premier Fishing, Sea Harvest and Irvin & Johnson, is investigated with the view of modelling and forecasting their volatilities. Initially, the comparison of volatility forecasts from symmetric and asymmetric GARCH-family models is employed. The results of competing models are tested using cross-validation of mean error measures and the Superior Predictive Ability (SPA) and Model Confidence Set (MCS) tests. Later, a Vector Autoregressive (VAR) model is applied to assess the impact of the four commonly cited internal factors on volatility. The research analysis results reveal a generally high volatility of the Western Cape fishing sector stocks. When univariate GARCH models are applied, the asymmetric GARCH-family models (EGARCH and GJR), with fat tails, appear dominant in the sets of competing models for all stocks, which highlights evidence of the leverage effect in the sector. However, GARCH (1,1), outperformed its counterparts in modelling and forecasting Irvin & Johnson (AVI) and Oceana (OCE) stocks. In the VAR modelling process, the Granger-causality tests indicate limited causal-relationship between EPS, MOS, FCF and the company Net-worth with the companies’ volatility measures. The variance decomposition of the 10-year ahead forecast of volatility indicates that volatility lag, free cash flow and networth have the largest contribution on volatility in the long-run, followed by margin of safety. In view of the above observations, the research discusses recommendations to the Western Cape fishing business to improve business returns and sustainability. / MT2017