Are price limits really bad for equity markets?

Despite widely documented criticisms, price-limit rules are present in many equity markets around the world. Using a game-theoretic model, we argue that, if the cost of monitoring a market is high, price-limit rules are beneficial. Empirical tests based on a cross section of 43 equity markets across five continents support our theoretical prediction. We find that the probability of the existence of price-limit rules is greater in markets that incur higher monitoring costs due to poorer business disclosure, more corruption and less efficiency in legal, regulatory and technological environments. (C) 2010 Published by Elsevier B.V.