The test of investors' behavioral bias through the price discovery process in cryptoasset exchange" Transactional-level evidence from Thailand

TL;DR

This paper examines how retail investors' behavioral biases influence the price discovery process in Thailand's cryptoasset market, revealing that investors' disposition effect causes delays in price adjustments during market upturns.

Contribution

It provides empirical evidence of behavioral biases affecting price discovery in crypto markets, highlighting the impact of the disposition effect on bid-offer adjustments.

Findings

Investors exhibit the disposition effect by selling profitable positions during upturns.

Bid-offer quote adjustments are significantly slower when most investors are in profit.

Behavioral biases influence the risk-return dynamics between bull and bear markets.

Abstract

Analyzing investors' trading behavior in cryptoasset markets provides new evidence supporting the theory that retail investors likely exhibit behavioral biases. We investigate the price discovery process between Thailand's most highly liquid exchange and the global exchange. Under the no-arbitrage assumption, bid-offer quotes in the local exchange should quickly move to match the new price levels in the global exchange, as the price process of cryptoassets in the local exchange does not contain new information that can lead the price dynamic in the global exchange. We analyze intraday bid-offer quotes and investors' portfolio positions and find that investors exhibit the disposition effect by attempting to sell their profitable positions during market upturns. The rate of bid-offer movement is significantly slow to match a new global price level only in situations when most investors in the market are in profit. These insights are crucial as they suggest that the risk-return characteristics of asset prices between the bull and bear market may differ, resulting from investors' behavioral biases.