Can stock returns be used as a proxy for corporate bond yields?

Abstract

In this paper, I have investigated the relationship between the change in yield and stock returns for 27 firms for 47 consecutive business days. Firstly, I have found that there is an inverse relationship between the rating of firms and the degree of correlation between the stock return and the change in yield for bonds issued by the same firm. Secondly, I have not successfully managed to demonstrate that this relationship has a timing property in general. It was found for only one of the firms. Thirdly, it seems that the most common feature among the firms that exhibits a significant relationship is a large and sudden change of the stock price, but I have not statistical evidence for this claim.