Business fluctuations and cycles

• Electronic Transactions as High-Frequency Indicators of Economic Activity

  Staff Working Paper 2007-58 John Galbraith, Greg Tkacz

  Since the advent of standard national accounts data over 60 years ago, economists have traditionally relied on monthly or quarterly data supplied by central statistical agencies for macroeconomic modelling and forecasting.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles JEL Code(s): E, E1, E17, E2, E27, E6, E66

• The Impact of Emerging Asia on Commodity Prices

  Staff Working Paper 2007-55 Sylvie Morin, Calista Cheung

  Over the past 5 years, real energy and non-energy commodity prices have trended sharply higher. These relative price movements have had important implications for inflation and economic activity in both Canada and the rest of the world. China has accounted for the bulk of incremental demand for oil and many base metals over this period.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, International topics JEL Code(s): E, E3, F, F4, O, O1, O19, Q, Q1, Q11

• The Bank of Canada's Version of the Global Economy Model (BoC-GEM)

  Technical Report No. 98 René Lalonde, Dirk Muir

  The Bank of Canada's version of the Global Economy Model (BoC-GEM) is derived from the model created at the International Monetary Fund by Douglas Laxton (IMF) and Paolo Pesenti (Federal Reserve Bank of New York and National Bureau of Economic Research).

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Technical reports Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Economic models, International topics JEL Code(s): C, C6, C68, E, E2, E27, E3, E37, F, F3, F32, F4, F47

• Cyclical Behavior of Debt and Equity Using a Panel of Canadian Firms

  Staff Working Paper 2007-44 Francisco Covas, Wouter den Haan

  We document the cyclical behavior of debt, equity, and retained earnings for different firm categories using firm-level Canadian data.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles JEL Code(s): E, E3, E32, G, G3, G32

• The Canadian Business Cycle: A Comparison of Models

  Staff Working Paper 2007-38 Frédérick Demers, Ryan Macdonald

  This paper examines the ability of linear and nonlinear models to replicate features of real Canadian GDP. We evaluate the models using various business-cycle metrics.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Econometric and statistical methods JEL Code(s): C, C3, C32, E, E3, E37

• Corporate Balance Sheets in Developed Economies: Implications for Investment

  Staff Working Paper 2007-24 Denise Côté, Christopher Graham

  In this paper, the authors examine the aggregate national balance-sheets of non-financial corporations in Australia and the G7 countries with a view to assessing both their financial structure and their financial position. More importantly, the authors investigate whether the financial position of non-financial corporations (i.e., debt-to-equity ratio) is material to the economy's investment prospects and whether the importance of this channel differs depending on the structure of corporate financing i.e., bank-based or market-oriented financing structures.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, International topics JEL Code(s): E, E2, E22, E3, E32, E4, E44

• Technology Shocks and Business Cycles: The Role of Processing Stages and Nominal Rigidities

  Staff Working Paper 2007-7 Louis Phaneuf, Nooman Rebei

  This paper develops and estimates a dynamic general equilibrium model that realistically accounts for an input-output linkage between firms operating at different stages of processing. Firms face technological change which is specific to their processing stage and charge new prices according to stage-specific Calvo-probabilities.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Economic models JEL Code(s): E, E3, E32

• Housing Market Cycles and Duration Dependence in the United States and Canada

  Staff Working Paper 2007-2 Rose Cunningham, Ilan Kolet

  Housing wealth is a large component of total wealth and plays an important role in aggregate business cycles. In this paper, we explore data on real house price cycles at the aggregate level and city level for the United States and Canada.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Econometric and statistical methods JEL Code(s): C, C4, C41, E, E3, E32, R, R2, R21

• How Far Can Forecasting Models Forecast? Forecast Content Horizons for Some Important Macroeconomic Variables

  Staff Working Paper 2007-1 John Galbraith, Greg Tkacz

  For stationary transformations of variables, there exists a maximum horizon beyond which forecasts can provide no more information about the variable than is present in the unconditional mean. Meteorological forecasts, typically excepting only experimental or exploratory situations, are not reported beyond this horizon; by contrast, little generally accepted information about such maximum horizons is available for economic variables.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Econometric and statistical methods JEL Code(s): C, C5, C53