Impacts of Introducing Index Futures on Stock Market Volatilities: New Evidences from China

Abstract

In April 2015, two index futures, IH and IC, respectively underlying big blue chip and small-medium stock indexes, were launched in China. However, because of a market crash, they came under strict control four months later. Using a panel-data evaluation approach, this paper examines how the introduction of IH and IC affect the volatility of their corresponding stocks. Results show that IH significantly reduces spot volatility before (after) a crash, but its function is significantly weakened during a crash. IC always fails to stabilize the spot market and even largely magnifies volatility during (after) a crash. Such different intervention effects on the two spot markets result mainly from the different levels of speculation on them.