Bitcoin price jumps and investor sentiment indicators

Abstract

Bitcoin has attracted significant attention from investors over recent years. Due to infrequent jumps in Bitcoin prices, this paper employs the ARJI model of Chan and Maheu (2002) to describe jump risks of Bitcoin prices, and to examine the possible influencing factors of jump risks. Empirical results find that the jump component is the most important driving force of the volatility of Bitcoin returns, and that two investor sentiment indicators (the Bitcoin trading volumes and the number of Bitcoin unique addresses) are positive related to the jump risk of Bitcoin returns. These findings provide an important insight into the investment risk of Bitcoin prices.