Financial Markets’ Reaction to COVID-19 Pandemic: Panel Data Analysis for SAARC Countries

This article looks at the financial markets’ reaction to COVID-19 pandemic by using Panel Data Analysis method for SAARC countries over the period January 27, 2020 to June 30, 2020. By employing the Hausman test and random effect model this study finds that stock market has negative reaction to the daily growth in number of COVID-19 confirmed case and deaths. And this reaction is very strong for COVID-19 confirmed case compared to the growth in death. Again, the daily growth in number of recovered corona patient, and the recovery rate have positive association with stock market but weakly. Correlation matrix among variables finds that the daily growth in COVID-19 confirmed cases in SAARC country has strong negative correlation with stock market returns. Overall, this investigation implies that stock markets’ reaction depends on severity of the outbreak and stages of COVID-19 spread.