International shocks and interdependence: Cointegration results from the major equity markets

This study subjects the world's major stock markets to cointegration tests in an effort to respond to the common investigation that the major equity markets tend to move together with the U.S. market. The relationships between the United States and Canada, France, Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom will be investigated. Not only will the entire period of 1970-1991.3 be examined, but the pre-1987 crash and the post-1987 crash periods as well. In addition, the Chow test will be employed to probe for any structural change occurrence relating to the worldwide stock market crash of October 1987. Evidence of cointegration is found to exist vis-a-vis the U.S. with the U.K. and Germany for the entire period; however, since the crash, only the U.K. and Japan have exhibited equilibrium relations. Absolutely no cointegration was detected for Canada nor France with the U.S. market.