This paper provides evidence on the asymmetric sensitivity of stock returns of French firms to exchange rate risk and the effect of foreign currency (FC) derivative use in alleviating this risk. The results show that FC exposure is frequently asymmetric and differs with respect to the US dollar (USD) and non-USD currencies. Cross sectional analysis provides evidence that FC derivatives use has a significant effect on reducing FC exposure to appreciations and depreciations of non-USD currencies and depreciations of the USD, but not to appreciations of the USD. on firm value. 2 There is also a substantial literature on the foundations of currency risk exposure analyzing the parameters and transmission mechanisms that determine a firm's sensitivity to exchange rate movements (see, e.g., mention only a few, 4 find that only a small percentage of their sample firms show significant exchange rate exposure. Although this could be interpreted as preliminary evidence that hedging may be neutralizing exposure, this evidence is weakened by the fact that there does not seem to be much difference in significant exposure rates between hedgers and nonhedgers. Furthermore, Allayannis and Ofek (2001) and Hagelin and Prambourg (2004) suggest that FC hedging, although often negative and significant, has only a marginal effect on FC exposure. 5 Given the contemporary empirical status quo, this paper revisits the world of exchange rate exposure and FC derivatives use in the context of potential asymmetries in reactions of stock returns to currency appreciations and depreciations. There is a theoretical literature on firm behavior-hysterisis (e.g., Ljungqvist, 1994;Christophe, 1997) and pricing-to-market (Knetter, 1994;Marston, 2001)-that implies the possibility of asymmetric reactions of stock returns to currency appreciations and depreciations. There is also a wide range of FC options, including caps, collars, Asians, baskets, binaries, lookbacks, and swaptions, to mention only a few, that make asymmetric hedging strategies cheap and practical. Finally, there is a small but growing literature on asymmetric currency exposure (e.g., Choi and Prasad, 1995;Di Iorio and Faff, 2000;Krishnamoorthy, 2001; Martin, 2003a, b, andOh andLee, 2004) with some evidence that FC exposure asymmetry is frequent and widespread. For example, using data from four major economies, namely, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States over the period 1992-1998Koutmos and Martin (2003a find that in approximately 40 per cent of the country-sector models they study, there is significant exchange rate exposure and over 40 per cent of the significant exposures turn out to be asymmetric. This paper studies the effect of FC derivatives use in the context of asymmetric sensitivity to exchange rate movements. More specifically, it 28 Ephraim Clark and Salma Mefteh r