Impact of behavioral biases on investment behavior: Mediating role of neuroticism among Indian retail investors

The biggest challenge facing countries, including India, is creating and managing an LCR (low carbon resilient) economy, which balances the need for high growth rates and is environmentally sustainable. The green bond market provides investors the means to help change the economy into an LCR economy. The study was undertaken to understand the key drivers and the factors influencing the individual retail investor’s decision to invest in green bonds. A survey instrument was designed and administered through the snowball sampling technique to 125 Indian respondents of various age groups who were eligible to invest in the Indian bond market. SPSS software was used to conduct a descriptive analysis followed by regression and conjoint analyses. The study results suggest that the Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) rating and credit rating of the green bond issuers are the key factors that influence an individual’s investment decision. The findings also highlight that incentives such as tax exemptions and awareness of green bonds also affect an investor’s decision. This research stands out as one of the first attempts to understand the Indian retail investors’ perception of a green bond.

The impact of news on individual investor decision is explicit as investors need to update, adapt and forecast returns with constraints of time, uncertainty and resources to be successful. The aim is to understand and review the influence of news on individual investor’s decision making in stock markets and identify the impact of different type of news on individual investor’s decision making in stock markets, assess the behavioral reaction and investment decisions made by investors before and after there is news item, identify the linking effect on behavioral theories and biases, develop a generalized decision making conceptual model to understand the impact of news on investor’s reaction, decision and its linkages along with the behavioral bias. Theoretical basis/methodology for processing of news by investors is assumed to be based on Broadbent’s filter theory (1958) and due to cognitive informational inefficiency of investors it assesses the attention and the investor’s reaction of overreaction and underreaction, which do not comply with efficient market hypothesis theory. The reasons for its noncompliance are found by relating it with behavioral theories. The results explain how investor screens with filters and give attention to news only when it affects their portfolio or investment objective and strategies. It is concluded that investor’s decision making depends on degree of information penetration, information content, information influence, specific internal factors and generic external and on investors prevailing at that given circumstances. This gives us the solution to comprehend the investor’s reaction, decision and unresolved reversals, short- and long-term overreaction.

COVID-19 has caused not only unprecedented health crises but also economic crises among individuals across the world. White-collar (salaried-class) employees with a fixed salary face financial insecurity due to job loss, pay cuts and uncertainty in retaining a job. This study examines the financial behavior of Indian white-collar salaried-class investors to their cognitive biases. In addition, the mediating effect of financial self-efficacy on cognitive biases and financial behavior is examined. Respondents were given structured questionnaires (google forms) through emails and WhatsApp for data collection. SPSS and R-PLS are used to analyze the data. Conservatism (r = –.603, p < 0.05) and herding bias (r = –.703, p < 0.05) have a significant negative correlation with financial behavior. Financial self-efficacy has a significant positive correlation (r =.621. p < 0.050). Conservatism and herding predicted 60.5% and 62.2% of the variance, respectively. The direct and indirect paths between conservatism bias, financial self-efficacy, and financial behavior are significant. The paths between herding, financial self-efficacy and financial behavior are also significant.

Acknowledgement
The authors express their sincere gratitude to Dr Suresha B (Associate Professor, School of business and management, CHRIST (Deemed to be university), Bangalore, India ) for encouraging and motivating them to accomplish this research task. The authors also extend their sincere thanks to Prof. Krishna T.A. (Assistant Professor, School of business and management, CHRIST (Deemed to be university), Bangalore, India) and Dr Sridevi Nair (Assistant Professor, School of business and management, CHRIST (Deemed to be university), Bangalore, India) for their support throughout this empirical investigation.