Main Street’s Pain, Wall Street’s Gain

Abstract

We propose a fiscal policy expectations mechanism. When bad macro news arrives (in our study, when initial jobless claims (IJC) are higher than expected), investors may expect more generous government spending and drive up aggregate stock prices through the expected cash flow channel. Using a time-series sample from January 2013 to March 2021, we find that this phenomenon emerges when newspapers mention fiscal policy more. In the cross section, firms expected to receive more government spending – through stimulus supports during COVID-19 or procurement contracts before 2020 – exhibit higher individual stock returns when bad IJC shocks arrive.