---
title: "Stock returns research: papers, trends and top journals"
description: "From 2017 to 2026 (so far), the keyword “stock returns” appeared in 2,208 papers in the tracked journals, most of them in finance (1,433), economics (477) and management (85)."
url: https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/stock-returns
markdown_url: https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/stock-returns.md
license: CC BY-NC 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)
share_text: "From 2017 to 2026 (so far), the keyword “stock returns” appeared in 2,208 papers in the tracked journals, most of them in finance (1,433), economics (477) and management (85). (as of 2026-11-03)"
data_url: https://scholar4ai.com/data/rankings.json
updated: 2026-11-03T18:03:37+09:00
window: 2026-10-05 to 2026-11-03
source: OpenAlex (CC0)
---

# Papers on “stock returns”

Research on “stock returns” in the 480 tracked journals: papers per year and category, the journals, institutions and countries publishing it, the keywords studied with it and its most-cited papers. It is not among the most frequent keywords of the last 30 days, so this page has no list of its latest papers.

Back to the ranking: https://scholar4ai.com/rankings/keywords.md

## Key findings

- From 2017 to 2026 (so far), the keyword “stock returns” appeared in 2,208 papers in the tracked journals, most of them in finance (1,433), economics (477) and management (85).
- 228 of them were published in 2025, against 158 in 2017.
- Since 2023, the institutions with the most of these papers were Southwestern University of Finance and Economics (21), Xiamen University (15) and Hunan University (14).
- The journals publishing most of them were Finance research letters (120), International Review of Financial Analysis (64) and International Review of Economics & Finance (49).
- The most-cited of them is “Do Investors Care about Carbon Risk?” (Journal of Financial Economics, 2019), with 3,369 citations.

## Papers per year

*Papers per publication year and category*

| Category | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | 2026 (so far) |
|---|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|
| [Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/finance.md) | 100 | 113 | 115 | 144 | 154 | 175 | 172 | 171 | 158 | 131 |
| [Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/economics.md) | 36 | 37 | 55 | 48 | 59 | 52 | 56 | 55 | 44 | 35 |
| [Management](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/management.md) | 7 | 7 | 10 | 8 | 13 | 11 | 15 | 5 | 6 | 3 |
| [Accounting](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/accounting.md) | 6 | 9 | 3 | 5 | 6 | 11 | 7 | 9 | 10 | 8 |
| [Operations Research](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/operations-research.md) | 1 | 1 | 8 | 1 | 6 | 5 | 4 | 9 | 4 | 2 |
| [Statistics](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/statistics.md) | 1 | 6 | 2 | 3 | 7 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 2 |
| [Marketing](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/marketing.md) | 3 | 0 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 1 |
| [Tourism and Hospitality](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/tourism-and-hospitality.md) | 1 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| [AI](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/ai.md) | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 6 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| [Information Systems](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/information-systems.md) | 2 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| [Health Economics and Policy](https://scholar4ai.com/categories/health-economics-and-policy.md) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| All categories | 158 | 176 | 202 | 216 | 257 | 264 | 265 | 256 | 228 | 186 |

## Where the papers come from

*Journals with the most papers, since 2023*

| # | Journal | Papers |
|---:|---|---:|
| 1 | [Finance research letters](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/finance-research-letters.md) | 120 |
| 2 | [International Review of Financial Analysis](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/international-review-of-financial-analysis.md) | 64 |
| 3 | [International Review of Economics & Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/international-review-of-economics-finance.md) | 49 |
| 4 | [Research in International Business and Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/research-in-international-business-and-finance.md) | 48 |
| 5 | [Pacific-Basin Finance Journal](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/pacific-basin-finance-journal.md) | 44 |
| 6 | [Economics Letters](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/economics-letters.md) | 36 |
| 7 | [The North American Journal of Economics and Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/the-north-american-journal-of-economics-and-finance.md) | 30 |
| 8 | [Energy Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/energy-economics.md) | 25 |
| 9 | [Journal of Banking & Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/journal-of-banking-finance.md) | 23 |
| 10 | [Journal of Empirical Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/journal-of-empirical-finance.md) | 23 |

*Institutions with the most papers, since 2023*

| # | Institution | Papers |
|---:|---|---:|
| 1 | [Southwestern University of Finance and Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/southwestern-university-of-finance-and-economics.md) | 21 |
| 2 | [Xiamen University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/xiamen-university.md) | 15 |
| 3 | [Hunan University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/hunan-university.md) | 14 |
| 4 | [Lebanese American University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/lebanese-american-university.md) | 12 |
| 5 | [Central University of Finance and Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/central-university-of-finance-and-economics.md) | 11 |
| 6 | [Chinese Academy of Sciences](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/chinese-academy-of-sciences.md) | 10 |
| 7 | [Peking University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/peking-university.md) | 10 |
| 8 | [Renmin University of China](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/renmin-university-of-china.md) | 10 |
| 9 | [Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/xian-jiaotong-liverpool-university.md) | 10 |
| 10 | [Capital University of Economics and Business](https://scholar4ai.com/institutions/capital-university-of-economics-and-business.md) | 9 |

*Countries with the most papers, since 2023*

| # | Country | Papers |
|---:|---|---:|
| 1 | China | 272 |
| 2 | United States | 217 |
| 3 | United Kingdom | 99 |
| 4 | South Korea | 46 |
| 5 | Australia | 43 |
| 6 | France | 43 |
| 7 | Germany | 42 |
| 8 | Italy | 39 |
| 9 | India | 38 |
| 10 | Taiwan | 37 |

*Keywords with the most papers, since 2023*

| # | Keyword | Papers |
|---:|---|---:|
| 1 | [COVID-19 pandemic](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/covid-19-pandemic.md) | 86 |
| 2 | [investor sentiment](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/investor-sentiment.md) | 83 |
| 3 | [Chinese stock market](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/chinese-stock-market.md) | 64 |
| 4 | [stock market volatility](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/stock-market-volatility.md) | 50 |
| 5 | asset pricing | 47 |
| 6 | [ESG ratings](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/esg-ratings.md) | 41 |
| 7 | return predictability | 39 |
| 8 | [corporate governance](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/corporate-governance.md) | 37 |
| 9 | [abnormal returns](https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/abnormal-returns.md) | 36 |

## Most-cited papers

*Most-cited papers since 2017*

| # | Citations | Per month | Title | Journal | Published | Authors |
|---:|---:|---:|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3,369 | 35.8 | [Do Investors Care about Carbon Risk?](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfineco.2021.05.008) | [Journal of Financial Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/journal-of-financial-economics.md) | 2019-01-01 | Patrick G M Bolton, Marcin T. Kacperczyk |
| 2 | 1,688 | 22.6 | [The role of ESG performance during times of financial crisis: Evidence from COVID-19 in China](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.frl.2020.101716) | [Finance research letters](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/finance-research-letters.md) | 2020-08-13 | David C. Broadstock, Kalok Chan, Louis T. W. Cheng et al. |
| 3 | 1,481 | 18.0 | [Corporate Immunity to the COVID-19 Pandemic](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfineco.2021.03.005) | [Journal of Financial Economics](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/journal-of-financial-economics.md) | 2020-01-01 | Wenzhi Ding, Ross Eric Levine, Chen Lin et al. |
| 4 | 1,436 | 18.2 | [Death and contagious infectious diseases: Impact of the COVID-19 virus on stock market returns](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbef.2020.100326) | [Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/journal-of-behavioral-and-experimental-finance.md) | 2020-04-08 | Abdullah M. Al-Awadhi, Abdullah M. Al-Awadhi, Khaled Alsaifi et al. |
| 5 | 1,254 | 16.2 | [Stock markets’ reaction to COVID-19: Cases or fatalities?](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ribaf.2020.101249) | [Research in International Business and Finance](https://scholar4ai.com/journals/research-in-international-business-and-finance.md) | 2020-05-22 | Badar Nadeem Ashraf |

## Cite this page

Scholar4AI. (2026). Papers on “stock returns”. Journal and Conference Research Rankings. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/stock-returns

```bibtex
@misc{scholar4ai-keywords-stock-returns,
  author = {{Scholar4AI}},
  title = {Papers on “stock returns”},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {\url{https://scholar4ai.com/keywords/stock-returns}},
  urldate = {2026-11-03},
  note = {Journal and Conference Research Rankings; data from OpenAlex (CC0); licensed CC BY-NC 4.0}
}
```

License: CC BY-NC 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).