A Nonparametric Examination of Market Information: application to technical trading rules

Abstract

This paper develops a nonparametric approach for testing whether an information set is useful for generating greater stock market returns. The approach is model free and thus the test of the information does not depend on the particular assumptions of an asset pricing model. Assuming No Arbitrage, a stochastic discount factor (SDF) is constructed from observed market assets. This SDF can be used as a pricing operator for examining dynamic portfolio returns to indicate the information content in the underlying trading strategy. Trading strategies based on technical trading rules are examined with the developed approach.