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Asian Review of Financial Research Vol.21 No.1 pp.1-32
Equity Premium Puzzle in Korean Stock Market
Insu Kim* Lecturer, Kookmin University
Chung-hun Hong Kookmin University, College of Business Administration
Key Words : Equity Premium Puzzles,Calibration,Risk-free Rates,Fundamentals,Dividend Growth Model

Abstract

In this paper, we explore the historical equity premiums in Korean stock market, and examine whether there is equity premium puzzle in Korean market, which is, as noted in Siegel(1998) and Campbell(2001), universally observed in major financial markets. We, however, find that equity premiums in Korean market are very small, and conclude that there is no equity premium puzzle in Korean market. There may be several reasons that equity premium puzzle is not observed in Korean market: short sample period, errors in estimating risk free rates, very low risk aversion, and/or undervaluation of Korean stock market. Among these factors, we argue that undervaluation is the most responsible factor for low equity premiums. We estimate equity returns with fundamentals such as dividends and earnings, then calculate equity premiums. We find that equity premiums estimated with fundamentals are much large than historical equity premiums. This implies that Korean stock market may not be free from equity premium puzzle.
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