Dynamics of the Turkish paintings market: A comprehensive empirical study

Abstract

This paper constructs the most comprehensive paintings price index in Turkey by using 32,391 manually collected sales transactions, including artworks of 413 artists over the period 1990-2016. The results indicate that the Turkish paintings market underperforms the domestic stock market, but leading to the higher returns compared to the global paintings and the global stock markets. The results from the causality analysis also demonstrate that there is the feedback effect between the domestic paintings and the domestic stock market. Furthermore, the findings cannot reject the null hypothesis that there is no bubble in the Turkish Paintings price index. Finally, the geopolitical and the political risks in Turkey are among the main reasons for the diminishing returns of the Turkish paintings market after 2010.