How COVID-19 Affected Herding Behavior in the Jordanian Stock Market

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to test the effect of COVID-19 pandemic on the presence of herding behavior in Amman stock exchange at market-level and at industry-level. This quantitative study covered five years and three months before the COVID-19 pandemic (from January 2015 to March 2020) and eight months during the pandemic (from May to December 2020). The cross-sectional absolute deviation (CSAD) was used to test the presence of herding in the market and in its sectors. Study results suggested that the COVID-19 pandemic has no effect on herding behavior in the Jordanian market at both market-level and industry-level.