August 15, 2013
E - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics
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August 15, 2013
The Accuracy of Short-Term Forecast Combinations
This article examines whether combining forecasts of real GDP from different models can improve forecast accuracy and considers which model-combination methods provide the best performance. In line with previous literature, the authors find that combining forecasts generally improves forecast accuracy relative to various benchmarks. Unlike several previous studies, however, they find that, rather than assigning equal weights to each model, unequal weighting based on the past forecast performance of models tends to improve accuracy when forecasts across models are substantially different. -
August 15, 2013
Monitoring Short-Term Economic Developments in Foreign Economies
The Bank of Canada uses several short-term forecasting models for the monitoring of key foreign economies - the United States, the euro area, Japan and China. The design of the forecasting models used for each region is influenced by the level of detail required, as well as the timeliness and volatility of data. Forecasts from different models are typically combined to mitigate model uncertainty, and judgment is applied to the model forecasts to incorporate information that is not directly reflected in the most recent indicators. -
Is There a Quality Bias in the Canadian CPI? Evidence from Micro Data
Rising consumer prices may reflect shifts by consumers to new higher-priced products, mostly for durable and semi-durable goods. I apply Bils’ (2009) methodology to newly available Canadian consumer price data for non-shelter goods and services to estimate how price increases can be divided between quality growth and price inflation. -
The Threat of Counterfeiting in Competitive Search Equilibrium
Recent studies in monetary theory show that if buyers can use lotteries to signal the quality of bank notes, counterfeiting does not occur in a pooling equilibrium. In this paper, I investigate the robustness of this non-existence result by considering an alternative trading mechanism. -
Money Market Rates and Retail Interest Regulation in China: The Disconnect between Interbank and Retail Credit Conditions
Interest rates in China are composed of a mix of both market-determined interest rates (interbank rates and bond yields), and regulated interest rates (retail lending and deposit rates), reflecting China’s gradual process of interest rate liberalization. -
Business Cycle Effects of Credit Shocks in a DSGE Model with Firm Defaults
This paper proposes a theoretical framework to analyze the relationship between credit shocks, firm defaults and volatility, and to study the impact of credit shocks on business cycle dynamics. -
What Central Bankers Need to Know about Forecasting Oil Prices
Forecasts of the quarterly real price of oil are routinely used by international organizations and central banks worldwide in assessing the global and domestic economic outlook, yet little is known about how best to generate such forecasts. Our analysis breaks new ground in several dimensions. -
May 16, 2013
Unconventional Monetary Policies: Evolving Practices, Their Effects and Potential Costs
Following the recent financial crisis, major central banks have introduced several types of unconventional monetary policy measures, including liquidity and credit facilities, asset purchases and forward guidance. To date, these measures appear to have been successful. They restored market functioning, facilitated the transmission of monetary policy and supported economic activity. They have potential costs, however, including challenges related to the greatly expanded balance sheets of central banks and the eventual exit from these measures, as well as the vulnerabilities that can arise from prolonged monetary accommodation. -
A New Linear Estimator for Gaussian Dynamic Term Structure Models
This paper proposes a novel regression-based approach to the estimation of Gaussian dynamic term structure models that avoids numerical optimization.