Who wins in the money game? The case of KOSPI 200 futures

This study investigates the information advantage of each investor category (i.e., foreigners, individuals, institutions, and the others) in the Korean stock index (i.e., KOSPI 200) futures market. To evaluate the information advantage of each investor category, we calculate futures trading and position gains; review and criticize the Value Weighted Average Price (VWAP) measure; and develop adjusted VWAP measures that are consistent with trading gains. Our main inferences are made based on adjusted VWAP measures. This study analyzes the transaction data of the nine years from January 1998 through 2006. From the perspectives of the adjusted VWAP measures, our findings support the information advantage of foreign investors over domestic (particularly, domestic individual) investors in the KOSPI 200 futures market.

► Foreign investors outperform domestic individual investors.
► Average daily VWAP not useful for evaluating information advantage
► An adjusted VWAP measure is developed.
► Adjusted VWAP being exactly consistent with trading gain
► Foreign investors are not an enemy, but just investors.