Term structure of risk in expected returns

Abstract

This article develops an empirical methodology to determine which economic shocks span risk in asset returns and fluctuations in discount rate and cash flow news. A theoretically motivated shock identification scheme in a present-value model identifies economic shocks. The choice of identifying restrictions is based on the properties of the term structure of risk in expected returns in the data and in equilibrium models. Empirically, I relate equity discount rate news and cash flow news to multiple sources of risk in the variance of consumption growth. Both types of news are almost equally important for the aggregate market risk.