Using a measure of political risk, relative to the United States, that captures unexpected political conditions, we show that political risk is priced in the cross section of currency momentum and contains information beyond other risk factors. Our results are robust after controlling for transaction costs, reversals, and alternative limits to arbitrage. The global political environment affects the profitability of the momentum strategy in the foreign exchange market; investors following such strategies are compensated for the exposure to the global political risk of those currencies they hold, that is, the past winners, and exploit the lower returns of loser portfolios. The risk compensation is mainly justified by the different exposures of foreign currencies in the momentum portfolio to U.S. political shocks, which is the main component of global political risk.
We study the role of domestic and global factors on payoffs of portfolios mimicking carry, dollar carry and momentum strategies. Using factors summarizing large datasets of macroeconomic and financial variables, we find that global equity market factors are predictive for carry trade returns, while U.S. inflation and consumption variables drive dollar carry trade payoffs, momentum returns are predominantly driven by U.S. inflation factors, and global factors capture the countercyclical nature of currency premia. We also find predictability in the exchange rate component of each strategy and demonstrate strong economic value to risk-averse investors with mean-variance preferences, regardless of base currency.
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