nep-mst New Economics Papers
on Market Microstructure
Issue of 2024‒06‒24
four papers chosen by
Thanos Verousis, Vlerick Business School


  1. Adaptive Optimal Market Making Strategies with Inventory Liquidation Cos By Jonathan Ch\'avez-Casillas; Jos\'e E. Figueroa-L\'opez; Chuyi Yu; Yi Zhang
  2. Clearing time randomization and transaction fees for auction market design By Thibaut Mastrolia; Tianrui Xu
  3. "Microstructure Modes" -- Disentangling the Joint Dynamics of Prices & Order Flow By Salma Elomari-Kessab; Guillaume Maitrier; Julius Bonart; Jean-Philippe Bouchaud
  4. Ponzi Funds By Philippe van der Beck; Jean-Philippe Bouchaud; Dario Villamaina

  1. By: Jonathan Ch\'avez-Casillas; Jos\'e E. Figueroa-L\'opez; Chuyi Yu; Yi Zhang
    Abstract: A novel high-frequency market-making approach in discrete time is proposed that admits closed-form solutions. By taking advantage of demand functions that are linear in the quoted bid and ask spreads with random coefficients, we model the variability of the partial filling of limit orders posted in a limit order book (LOB). As a result, we uncover new patterns as to how the demand's randomness affects the optimal placement strategy. We also allow the price process to follow general dynamics without any Brownian or martingale assumption as is commonly adopted in the literature. The most important feature of our optimal placement strategy is that it can react or adapt to the behavior of market orders online. Using LOB data, we train our model and reproduce the anticipated final profit and loss of the optimal strategy on a given testing date using the actual flow of orders in the LOB. Our adaptive optimal strategies outperform the non-adaptive strategy and those that quote limit orders at a fixed distance from the midprice.
    Date: 2024–05
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2405.11444&r=
  2. By: Thibaut Mastrolia; Tianrui Xu
    Abstract: Flaws of a continuous limit order book mechanism raise the question of whether a continuous trading session and a periodic auction session would bring better efficiency. This paper wants to go further in designing a periodic auction when both a continuous market and a periodic auction market are available to traders. In a periodic auction, we discover that a strategic trader could take advantage of the accumulated information available along the auction duration by arriving at the latest moment before the auction closes, increasing the price impact on the market. Such price impact moves the clearing price away from the efficient price and may disturb the efficiency of a periodic auction market. We thus propose and quantify the effect of two remedies to mitigate these flaws: randomizing the auction's closing time and optimally designing a transaction fees policy. Our results show that these policies encourage a strategic trader to send their orders earlier to enhance the efficiency of the auction market, illustrated by data extracted from Alphabet and Apple stocks.
    Date: 2024–05
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2405.09764&r=
  3. By: Salma Elomari-Kessab; Guillaume Maitrier; Julius Bonart; Jean-Philippe Bouchaud
    Abstract: Understanding the micro-dynamics of asset prices in modern electronic order books is crucial for investors and regulators. In this paper, we use an order by order Eurostoxx database spanning over 3 years to analyze the joint dynamics of prices and order flow. In order to alleviate various problems caused by high-frequency noise, we propose a double coarse-graining procedure that allows us to extract meaningful information at the minute time scale. We use Principal Component Analysis to construct "microstructure modes" that describe the most common flow/return patterns and allow one to separate them into bid-ask symmetric and bid-ask anti-symmetric. We define and calibrate a Vector Auto-Regressive (VAR) model that encodes the dynamical evolution of these modes. The parameters of the VAR model are found to be extremely stable in time, and lead to relatively high $R^2$ prediction scores, especially for symmetric liquidity modes. The VAR model becomes marginally unstable as more lags are included, reflecting the long-memory nature of flows and giving some further credence to the possibility of "endogenous liquidity crises". Although very satisfactory on several counts, we show that our VAR framework does not account for the well known square-root law of price impact.
    Date: 2024–05
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2405.10654&r=
  4. By: Philippe van der Beck; Jean-Philippe Bouchaud; Dario Villamaina
    Abstract: Many active funds hold concentrated portfolios. Flow-driven trading in these securities causes price pressure, which pushes up the funds' existing positions resulting in realized returns. We decompose fund returns into a price pressure (self-inflated) and a fundamental component and show that when allocating capital across funds, investors are unable to identify whether realized returns are self-inflated or fundamental. Because investors chase self-inflated fund returns at a high frequency, even short-lived impact meaningfully affects fund flows at longer time scales. The combination of price impact and return chasing causes an endogenous feedback loop and a reallocation of wealth to early fund investors, which unravels once the price pressure reverts. We find that flows chasing self-inflated returns predict bubbles in ETFs and their subsequent crashes, and lead to a daily wealth reallocation of 500 Million from ETFs alone. We provide a simple regulatory reporting measure -- fund illiquidity -- which captures a fund's potential for self-inflated returns.
    Date: 2024–05
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2405.12768&r=

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