Seasonal affective disorder and seasoned art auction prices: New evidence from old masters

• Psychological evidence predicts that seasons and weather are associated with mood.
• Finance literature documented links between seasons and weather and stock returns.
• We examine the art auction prices in England during 1756–1909.
• We find amount of daylight effect on the auction day affects selling prices.
• We find some effect of hours of sunshine, precipitation, temperature, and daylight changes.

Psychological evidence predicts that environmental conditions such as seasons and weather are associated with mood and the finance literature has documented links between them and daily stock market returns. In this paper we examine how these conditions affect art auction prices in England during 1756–1909. We find that the amount of daylight on the auction day has a significant positive effect on selling prices in all our model specifications. In addition, we find in some specifications direct positive effects stemming from the hours of sunshine during the day, precipitation, temperatures, and whether daylight hours are getting longer or shorter.