The Random Walk Behaviour of Malaysian Stock Market: Evidence from Individual Stocks

Authors

  • Kian-Ping Lim School of International Business and Finance Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Malaysia
  • Mathew Kien-Chung Vun School of International Business and Finance Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Malaysia
  • Hock-Ann Lee School of International Business and Finance Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Malaysia

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.32890/ijms2006.13.2.1

Keywords:

Random walk, weak-form efficiency, BDS test, Malaysian stock market

Abstract

This study re-examines the price behaviour of 77 individual stocks listed on Bursa Malaysia in light of the random walk hypothesis. With a new statistical tool, namely the Brock-Dechert-Scheinkman( BDS)test, it is possible to detect a more complex form of dependencies in series of financial returns that often appear completely random to standard statistical tests, such as serial correlation tests, runs test, variance ratio test and unit root tests. Our econometric results reveal that the market in general as proxied by the KLCI and all the 77 individual stocks do not follow a random walk process. This conclusion holds even when the sample period is broken down into two sub-periods with the exception of five stocks- IOICorp, KLK, MUllnd, Pos Hldgs and Tchong. The price behaviour of these five stocks in the sub-periods before and during the crisis provides empirical support to our conjecture that the Asian financial crisis in 1997 adversely affected the market's ability to price stocks efficiently, thus preventing stock prices from following a random walk process.

 

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Abhyankar, A. H., Copeland, L. S. & Wong, W. (1995). Nonlinear dynamics in real-time equity market indices: Evidence from the United Kingdom. Economic Journal, 105, 864-880.

Abhyankar, A. H., Copeland, L. S. & Wong, W. (1997). Uncovering nonlinear structure in real time stock-market indexes: The S&P 500, the DAX, the Nikkei 225, and the FTSE 100. Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, 15, 1-14.

Al-Loughani, N. & Chappell, D. (1997). On the validity of the weak-form efficient markets hypothesis applied to the London stock exchange. Applied Financial Economics, 7, 173-176.

Ammermann, P. A. & Patterson, D. M. (2003). The cross-sectional and cross-temporal universality of nonlinear serial dependencies: Evidence from world stock indices and the Taiwan Stock Exchange. Pacific-Basin Finance Journal, 11, 175-195.

Annuar, M. N., Ariff, M. & Shamsher, M. (1991). Technical analysis, unit root and weak-form efficiency of the KLSE. Banker's Journal Malaysia, 64, 55-58.

Annuar, M.N., Ariff, M. & Shamsher, M. (1993). Weak-form efficiency of the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange: An application of unit root analysis. Pertanika Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, 1, 57-62.

Annuar, M. N. & Shamsher, M. (1993). The efficiency of the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange: A collection of empirical findings. Selangor, Malaysia: Universiti Putra Malaysia Press. 34 IJMS 13 (2), 1-40 (2006).um.edu.my www.ijms

Antoniou, A., Ergul, N. & Holmes, P. (1997). Market efficiency, thin trading and non-linear behaviour: Evidence from an emerging market. European Financial Management, 3(2), 175-190.

Barkoulas, J. & Travlos, N. (1998). Chaos in an emerging capital market? The case of the Athens Stock Exchange. Applied Financial Economics, 8, 231-243.

Barnes, P. (1986). Thin trading and stock market efficiency: The case of the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange. Journal of Banking Finance and Accounting, 13, 609-617.

Brock, W. A., Dechert, W. D. & Scheinkman, J. A. (1987). A test for independence based on the correlation dimension. Working paper. University of Wisconsin, University of Houston, and University of Chicago.

Brock, W. A., Dechert, W. D., Scheinkman, J. A. & LeBaron, B. (1996). A test for independence based on the correlation dimension. Econometric Reviews, 15, 197-235.

Brock, W. A., Hsieh, D. A. & LeBaron, B. (1991). Nonlinear dynamics, chaos, and instability: statistical theory and economic evidence. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Brooks, C. (1996). Testing for non-linearity in daily sterling exchange rates. Applied Financial Economics, 6, 307-317.

Brooks, C. & Hinich, M. J. (1999). Cross-correlations and cross-bicorrelations in Sterling exchange rates. Journal of Empirical Finance, 6, 385-404.

Campbell, J. Y., Lo, A. W. & MacKinlay, A. C. (1997). The econometrics of financial markets. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Dawson, S. M. (1990). Technical analysis: Mixed signals from recent research. Banker's Journal Malaysia, 62 (December), 41-44.

De Grauwe, P., Dewachter, H. & Embrechts, M. (1993). Exchange rate theory: Chaotic models of foreign exchange markets. Oxford: Blackwell.

Fama, E. F. (1965). The behavior of stock market prices. Journal of Business, 38, 34-105.

Fama, E. F. (1970). Efficient capital markets: A review of theory and empirical work. Journal of Finance, 25, 383-417.

Fortune, P. (1991). Stock market efficiency: An autopsy? New England Economic Review, 15, 17-40.

Granger, C. W. J. (1975). A survey of empirical studies on capital markets. In EJ. Elton & M. J. Gruber (Eds.), International capital markets (pp.3-36). Amsterdam: North-Holland.

Grassberger, P. & Procaccia, I. (1983). Measuring the strangeness of strange attractors. Physica, 9D, 189-208.

Hinich, M. J. & Patterson, D. M (1985). Evidence of nonlinearity in daily stock returns. Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, 3, 69-77. IJMS 13 (2), 1-40 (2006) 35 www.ijms.um.edu.my

Hsieh, D. A. (1989). Testing for non-linearity in daily foreign exchange rate changes. Journal of Business, 62, 339-368.

Hsieh, D. A. (1991). Chaos and nonlinear dynamics: Application to financial markets. Journal of Finance, 46, 1839-1877.

Hsieh, D. A. & LeBaron, B. (1988a). Finite sample properties of the BDS-statistics I: Distribution under the null hypothesis. Mimeograph. University of Chicago, and University of Wisconsin.

Hsieh, D. A. & LeBaron, B. (1988b). Finite sample properties of the BDS-statistics II: Distribution under the alternative hypothesis. Mimeograph. University of Chicago, and University of Wisconsin.

Ko,K.S. & Lee, S. B. (1991). A comparative analysis of the daily behavior of stock returns: Japan, the U.S and the Asian NICs. Journal of Business Finance and Accounting, 18, 219-234.

Kok, K. L. & Goh, K. L. (1995). Malaysian securities market. Petaling Jaya, Selangor: Pelanduk Publications.

Kok, K. L. & Lee, F. F. (1994). Malaysian second board stock market and the efficient market hypothesis. Malaysian Journal of Economic Studies, 31(2), 1-13.

Lai, M. M., Balachandher, K. G. & Fauzias, M. N. (2003). An examination of the random walk model and technical trading rules in the Malaysian stock market. Quarterly Journal of Business and Economics, 41(1/2), 81-103.

Laurence, M. (1986). Weak-form efficiency in the Kuala Lumpur and Singapore stock markets. Journal of Banking and Finance, 10, 431-445.

Lee, C. L, Pan, M. S. & Liu, A. Y. (2001). On market efficiency of Asian foreign exchange rates: Evidence from a joint variance ratio test and technical trading rules. Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, 11, 199-214.

Liew, V. K. S., Chong, T. T. L. & Lim, K. P. (2003). The inadequacy of linear autoregressive model for real exchange rates: Empirical evidence from Asian economies. Applied Economics, 35, 1387-1392.

Lim, K. P., Habibullah, M. S. & Lee, H. A. (2003). A BDS test of random walk in the Malaysian stock market. Labuan Bulletin of International Business and Finance, 1(1), 29-39.

Lo, A. W. & MacKinlay, A. C. (1999). A non-random walk down Wall Street. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Mahajan, A. & Wagner, A. J. (1999). Nonlinear dynamics in foreign exchange rates. Global Finance Journal, 10, 1-23.

Malkiel, B. G. (2003). A random walk down Wall Street: The time-tested strategy for successful investing. 8" (ed.). New York: W. W. Norton & Company. 36 IJMS 13 (2), 1-40 (2006) www.ijms.um.edu.my

McMillan, D. G. & Speight, A. E. H. (2001). Nonlinearities in the black market zloty-dollar exchange rate: Some further evidence. Applied Financial Economics, 11, 209-220.

Mookerjee, R. & Yu, Q. (1999). An empirical analysis of the equity markets in China. Review of Financial Economics, 8, 41-60.

Opong, K. K., Mulholland, G., Fox, A. F. & Farahmand, K. (1999). The behavior of some UK equity indices: An application of Hurst and BDS tests. Journal of Empirical Finance, 6, 267-282.

Patterson, D. M. & Ashley, R. A. (2000). A nonlinear time series workshop: A toolkit for detecting and identifying nonlinear serial dependence. Boston: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

Saw, S. H. & Tan, K. C. (1989). Test of random walk hypothesis in the Malaysian stock market. Securities Industry Review, 15(1), 45-50.

Schachter, S., Gerin, W., Hood, D. C. & Andreassen, P. (1985). Was the South Sea Bubble a random walk? Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 6, 323-329.

Scheinkman, J. & LeBaron, B. (1989). Nonlinear dynamics and stock returns. Journal of Business, 62, 311-337.

Serletis, A. & Shintani, M. (2003). No evidence of chaos but some evidence of dependence in the US stock market. Chaos, Solitons and Fractals, 17, 449-454.

Singal, V. (2004). Beyond the random walk: A guide to stock market anomalies and low risk investing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Steurer, E. (1995). Nonlinear modeling of the DEM/USD exchange rate. In A.P. Refenes (Ed.), Neural networks in the capital markets (pp.199-211). New York: John Wiley & Sons.

Yong, O. (1989). The price behaviour of Malaysian stocks. Malaysian Management Review, 24(3), 23-34.

Yong, O. (1993a). Introduction: A brief review on the random walk hypothesis. In I. Ibrahim & O. Yong (Eds.), Understanding the behavioural patterns of stock prices: A collection of readings on selected far eastern stock markets (pp.3-10). Kuala Lumpur: Leeds Publications.

Yong, O. (1993b). Market efficiency (weak-form) of the Malaysian stock exchange. In I. Ibrahim & O. Yong (Eds.), Understanding the behavioural patterns of stock prices: A collection of readings on selected Far Eastern stock markets (pp.73-95). Kuala Lumpur: Leeds Publications. IJMS 13 (2), 1-40 (2006) 37 www.ijms.um.edu.my

Downloads

Published

06-12-2006

Research impact

Harvested 2026-09-08
0 citations recorded so far

Counts differ between services because each indexes a different body of literature. None of them is the whole picture.

Identifiers DOI 10.32890/ijms2006.13.2.1 OpenAlex W63020313 Semantic Scholar CorpusID 151069077

Most read articles by the same author(s)