Norihiro Kasuga

Bio: Norihiro Kasuga is an academic researcher from Konan University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Stock market & Mass media. The author has an hindex of 2, co-authored 4 publications receiving 9 citations.

Mass Media Effects on Trading Activities: Television Broadcasting Evidence from Japan

Abstract: This study examines how information broadcasting through television (TV) media influences stock market activities. Consistent with the effect of TV information to attract investor attention, we find that increased information flow via TV is significantly associated with greater trading volume and larger price change. Market liquidity (bid–ask spread) is improved for more TV information flows, suggesting that new information arrival in the market widens information asymmetry. As for information type, hard information from business-oriented programs and earnings-related news contributes to the attention effect of media compared with soft information. Finally, the impact of TV is more influential for stocks with more individual shareholders than those with institutional shareholders.

Cloud computing and its impact on the Japanese macroeconomy–its oligopolistic market characteristics and social welfare

Abstract: The cloud computing market is rapidly expanding and changing the nature of ICT across all sectors; cloud computing transforms ICT from a tool dependent upon investment and physical ownership to one that can easily make use of outside resources. On the other hand, cloud computing services are being provided not only for simple data storage, but for many purposes through several different service models, such as SaaS (Software as a Service), PaaS (Platform as a Service) and IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service). Due to, among other factors, the nature of its network externalities, the market seems to be gradually shifting to a market with oligopolistic characteristics in which the services are provided by a limited number of big-name firms. In this paper, the impact of the shift of the cloud computing market to a market with oligopolistic characteristics on utility-based social welfare is quantitatively estimated and analyzed utilizing DSGE (Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium) model-based simulation. The main objectives of the paper, rather than to ascertain the exact change of utility-based social welfare, are (1) to determine whether there is a (realistic) shifting path of macroeconomic variables in Japan’s case, under the shift and (2) to illustrate the dynamic interaction of the macroeconomic variables. Utility-based social welfare is chosen, because for the purpose of evaluating policy measures it would be more suitable than GDP. Also, several kinds of policy measures for the sound development of the cloud computing market that the industry and government can take are discussed in a sense related to a market with oligopolistic characteristics.

Mass media effects on trading activities: television broadcasting evidence from Japan

Abstract: This study examines how information broadcasting through television (TV) media influences stock market activities. Consistent with the effect of TV information to attract investor attention, we fin...

Corporate Advertisements and the Investor Attention Effect: Evidence from Television Commercials

Abstract: This study examines investor attention effects of corporate advertisings on trading activities by using daily data from television commercials (CM) in the Japanese market. This provides us with insights regarding the nature of investor attention in terms of ad volume, content type, and repeated information. Primarily, our findings indicate that, consistent with the attention-grabbing effect, an abnormally high CM frequency is positively and significantly associated with trading turnover. We found CMs had no significant effects on stock price response. When considering television viewership volume, our results only partially support the attention effect. Second, advertised content is important. The attention effect is mainly driven by CMs that promote a specific product, rather than CMs that emphasize corporate brand image, indicating that investor attention responds to concrete, informative messages. Finally, the initial high-attention effect decays over the course of the same product CM’s repetition, consistent with the wear-out effect.

The Role of Dissemination in Market Liquidity: Evidence from Firms' Use of Twitter

Abstract: Firm disclosures often reach only a portion of investors, which results in information asymmetry among investors, and therefore lower market liquidity. This issue is particularly salient for firms that are not highly visible, as they tend not to receive broad news dissemination via traditional intermediaries, such as the press. This paper examines whether firms can reduce information asymmetry by more broadly disseminating their news. To isolate the impact of dissemination, we focus our analysis on firms' use of Twitter and exploit the 140-character message restriction. Specifically, using a sample of technology firms, we examine the impact of using Twitter to send market participants links to press releases that are provided via traditional disclosure methods. We find this additional dissemination of firm-initiated news via Twitter is associated with lower abnormal bid-ask spreads and greater abnormal depths, consistent with a reduction in information asymmetry. Moreover, this result holds mainly for firms that are not highly visible, consistent with them being in greater need of this additional dissemination channel. We also examine the impact of dissemination on a volume-based measure of liquidity, and find that dissemination is positively associated with liquidity.

The Media and the Diffusion of Information in Financial Markets: Evidence from Newspaper Strikes

Abstract: The media are increasingly recognized as key players in financial markets. I investigate their causal impact on trading and price formation by examining national newspaper strikes in several countries. Trading volume falls 12% on strike days. The dispersion of stock returns and their intraday volatility are reduced by 7%, while aggregate returns are unaffected. Moreover, an analysis of return predictability indicates that newspapers propagate news from the previous day. These findings demonstrate that the media contribute to the efficiency of the stock market by improving the dissemination of information among investors and its incorporation into stock prices.

Social media effect, investor recognition and the cross-section of stock returns

Abstract: Investor recognition affects cross-sectional stock returns. In informationally incomplete markets, investors have limited recognition of all securities, and their holding of stocks with low recognition requires compensation for being imperfectly diversified. Using the number of posts on the Chinese social media platform Guba to measure investor recognition of stocks, this paper provides a direct test of Merton's investor recognition hypothesis. We find a significant social media premium in the Chinese stock market. We further find that including a social media factor based on this premium significantly improves the explanatory power of Fama-French factor models of cross-sectional stock returns, and these results are robust when we control for the mass media effect and liquidity effect. Finally, we find that investment strategies based on the social media factor earn sizable risk-adjusted returns, which signifies the importance of the social media premium in portfolio management.

Media Coverage and the Cross-Section of Stock Returns: The Chinese Evidence

Abstract: Using hand‐collected news headlines for a large sample of listed firms in China over a period of 2000–2015, we investigate the cross‐sectional relation between media coverage and stock returns. Our results document that no‐media coverage stocks earn 55 basis points a month higher than stocks that are featured in the media. This result is robust after controlling for common risk factors and is not driven by short‐run return reversals. Further analysis provides evidence to support the investor recognition hypothesis, suggesting that mass media may play an incremental role in providing a supplement to traditional channels of information dissemination. Therefore, results in this paper are of interests to both investors and regulators on drivers of stock returns.

Future Data Center Energy-Conservation and Emission-Reduction Technologies in the Context of Smart and Low-Carbon City Construction

Abstract: The energy consumption of data centers accounts for approximately 1% of that of the world, the average power usage effectiveness is in the range of 1.4–1.6, and the associated carbon emissions account for approximately 2–4% of the global carbon emissions. To reduce the energy consumption of data centers and promote smart, sustainable, and low-carbon city development, this study analyzes the energy conservation and emission-reduction technologies and potential decarbonization paths for data centers, compares the energy-saving situation of 20 typical data center cases, and highlights the impact of green data centers on the global carbon neutrality goal. The analysis reveals that data center energy consumption can be reduced by about 20–40% and 15–27% through IT equipment optimization and cooling technology improvements, respectively. Data center energy-saving strategies must consider differences in geographical location, natural resources, and economic bases. Therefore, this study examines the necessary steps for building zero-carbon data centers from the perspectives of public policy, technological innovation, and resource management. Specifically, the following aspects are explored: 1) accelerating the intelligent and unified management of data center resources; 2) building storage-computing integrated data centers that are compatible with heterogeneous resources and streamlined business models; 3) realizing large-scale and diversified use of clean energy in data centers.