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on Econometric Time Series |
| By: | Romain Aumond (CREST, ENSAE and Institut Polytechnique de Paris); Julien Royer (CREST and Institut Polytechnique de Paris) |
| Abstract: | Tracking macroeconomic data at a high frequency is difficult as most time series are only available at a low frequency. Recently, the development of macroeconomic nowcasters to infer the current position of the economic cycle has attracted the attention of both academics and practitioners, with most of the central banks having developed statistical tools to track their economic situation. The specifications usually rely on a Markov-switching dynamic factor model with mixed-frequency data whose states allow for the identification of recession and expansion periods. However, such models are notoriously not robust to the occurrence of extreme shocks such as Covid-19. In this paper, we show how the addition of time-varying volatilities in the dynamics of the model alleviates the effect of extreme observations and renders the dating of recessions more robust. Both stochastic and conditional volatility models are considered and we adapt recent Bayesian estimation techniques to infer the competing models parameters. We illustrate the good behavior of our estimation procedure as well as the robustness of our proposed model to various misspecifications through simulations. Additionally, in a real data exercise, it is shown how, both insample and in an out-of-sample exercise, the inclusion of a dynamic volatility component is beneficial for the identification of phases of the US economy |
| Keywords: | Nowcasting; BayesianInference; DynamicFactorModels; Markov Switching |
| Date: | 2024–03–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crs:wpaper:2024-04&r=ets |
| By: | Thilo Reinschl\"ussel; Martin C. Arnold |
| Abstract: | We propose a novel approach to elicit the weight of a potentially non-stationary regressor in the consistent and oracle-efficient estimation of autoregressive models using the adaptive Lasso. The enhanced weight builds on a statistic that exploits distinct orders in probability of the OLS estimator in time series regressions when the degree of integration differs. We provide theoretical results on the benefit of our approach for detecting stationarity when a tuning criterion selects the $\ell_1$ penalty parameter. Monte Carlo evidence shows that our proposal is superior to using OLS-based weights, as suggested by Kock [Econom. Theory, 32, 2016, 243-259]. We apply the modified estimator to model selection for German inflation rates after the introduction of the Euro. The results indicate that energy commodity price inflation and headline inflation are best described by stationary autoregressions. |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2402.16580&r=ets |
| By: | Benjamin Wee |
| Abstract: | Simulation Based Calibration (SBC) is applied to analyse two commonly used, competing Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithms for estimating the posterior distribution of a stochastic volatility model. In particular, the bespoke 'off-set mixture approximation' algorithm proposed by Kim, Shephard, and Chib (1998) is explored together with a Hamiltonian Monte Carlo algorithm implemented through Stan. The SBC analysis involves a simulation study to assess whether each sampling algorithm has the capacity to produce valid inference for the correctly specified model, while also characterising statistical efficiency through the effective sample size. Results show that Stan's No-U-Turn sampler, an implementation of Hamiltonian Monte Carlo, produces a well-calibrated posterior estimate while the celebrated off-set mixture approach is less efficient and poorly calibrated, though model parameterisation also plays a role. Limitations and restrictions of generality are discussed. |
| Date: | 2024–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2402.12384&r=ets |
| By: | Markus Bibinger; Nikolaus Hautsch; Alexander Ristig |
| Abstract: | We propose methods to infer jumps of a semi-martingale, which describes long-term price dynamics based on discrete, noisy, high-frequency observations. Different to the classical model of additive, centered market microstructure noise, we consider one-sided microstructure noise for order prices in a limit order book. We develop methods to estimate, locate and test for jumps using local order statistics. We provide a local test and show that we can consistently estimate price jumps. The main contribution is a global test for jumps. We establish the asymptotic properties and optimality of this test. We derive the asymptotic distribution of a maximum statistic under the null hypothesis of no jumps based on extreme value theory. We prove consistency under the alternative hypothesis. The rate of convergence for local alternatives is determined and shown to be much faster than optimal rates for the standard market microstructure noise model. This allows the identification of smaller jumps. In the process, we establish uniform consistency for spot volatility estimation under one-sided microstructure noise. A simulation study sheds light on the finite-sample implementation and properties of our new statistics and draws a comparison to a popular method for market microstructure noise. We showcase how our new approach helps to improve jump detection in an empirical analysis of intra-daily limit order book data. |
| Date: | 2024–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2403.00819&r=ets |