Pandemic Related Financial Market Volatility Spillovers

Utilising Chinese-developed data based on long-standing influenza indices and the more recently-developed coronavirus and face-mask indices, we set out to test for the presence of volatility spillovers from Chinese financial markets during the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic upon a broad number of traditional financial assets. Such indices are used to specifically measure the performance of Chinese companies who are inherently involved in the R&D and production of materials and products used to mitigate the effects of influenza and coronavirus, therefore, such indices present a unique barometer of investor sentiment relating to COVID-19 in comparison to traditional Chinese influenza. Within days of the formal announcement of the COVID-19 outbreak, results indicate exceptionally pronounced and persistent impacts of coronavirus on Chinese financial markets compared to that of the traditional and long-standing influenza index. Further, in a novel finding to date, COVID-19 is found to have had a substantial effect on directional spillovers upon the Bitcoin market. Cryptocurrency-based confidence appears to have been instigated through government-developed education schemes, which are identified as one possible explanation for our results, which are found to remain robust across methodological variation.