Corridor Volatility Risk and Expected Returns

Abstract

This paper examines the pricing of volatility risk using SPX corridor implied volatility. We decompose model-free implied volatility into various components using different segments of the cross-section of out-of-the money put and call option prices. We find that only model-free volatility computed from the cross-section of out-of-the-money call option prices carries a significant negative risk premium in the cross-section of stock returns and subsumes all relevant information for forecasting future volatility. Our empirical results provide strong evidence that SPX out-of-the money put option prices do not contain useful information for pricing aggregate volatility risk in the cross-section of stock returns.