What drives the uranium sector risk? The role of attention, economic and geopolitical uncertainty

A-Tier
Journal: Energy Economics
Year: 2024
Volume: 140
Issue: C

Authors (2)

Lyócsa, Štefan (Masarykova Univerzita) Todorova, Neda (not in RePEc)

Score contribution per author:

2.011 = (α=2.01 / 2 authors) × 2.0x A-tier

α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count

Abstract

Interest in nuclear energy has increased recently due to its low-carbon footprint, energy security concerns, and technological advances. Despite the recent surge in uranium stocks, there is a lack of research on uranium sector volatility. We fill this gap by analyzing the volatility of the Global X Uranium ETF (URA) from 2010 to 2024 using high-frequency data. Our analysis reveals that HAR models effectively capture URA volatility. Market-wide implied volatility and investor attention, captured by Google search volume, are found to contain valuable information for forecasting uranium sector volatility in an in-sample context. In contrast, economic and geopolitical uncertainty, as well as global financial risk, exhibit limited relevance. Although advanced models show some improvement in out-of-sample predictions, the basic HAR model remains a robust benchmark.

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:eee:eneeco:v:140:y:2024:i:c:s0140988324006881
Journal Field
Energy
Author Count
2
Added to Database
2026-01-25