Fear and Closed-End Fund Discounts

Closed end fund (CEF) discounts have intrigued researchers for decades. Of the many explanations offered, the behavioural framework of Lee et al. (1991), which posits noise traders subject to sentiment, is the most discussed. In this article, we contribute some novel evidence to the evaluation of this theory by examining the role of implied market volatility (VIX, i.e., the ¡°fear index¡±) in fund discounts using a dynamic conditional correlation (DCC) approach. We find that VIX has almost no role in determining discounts except during periods of extreme market turbulence, providing strong but indirect evidence for the sentiment story.