Greg Tkacz - Latest

• Inflation Changes, Yield Spreads, and Threshold Effects

  Staff Working Paper 2002-40 Greg Tkacz

  Using interest rate yield spreads to explain changes in inflation, we investigate whether such relationships can be modelled using two-regime threshold models.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Inflation and prices, Interest rates JEL Code(s): C, C5, C51, E, E3, E31

• A Consistent Bootstrap Test for Conditional Density Functions with Time-Dependent Data

  Staff Working Paper 2001-21 Fuchun Li, Greg Tkacz

  This paper describes a new test for evaluating conditional density functions that remains valid when the data are time-dependent and that is therefore applicable to forecasting problems. We show that the test statistic is asymptotically distributed standard normal under the null hypothesis, and diverges to infinity when the null hypothesis is false.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods JEL Code(s): C, C1, C12, C15, E, E3, E37

• Evaluating Factor Models: An Application to Forecasting Inflation in Canada

  Staff Working Paper 2001-18 Marc-André Gosselin, Greg Tkacz

  This paper evaluates the forecasting performance of factor models for Canadian inflation. This type of model was introduced and examined by Stock and Watson (1999a), who have shown that it is quite promising for forecasting U.S. inflation.

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

• Evaluating Linear and Non-Linear Time-Varying Forecast-Combination Methods

  Staff Working Paper 2001-12 Fuchun Li, Greg Tkacz

  This paper evaluates linear and non-linear forecast-combination methods. Among the non-linear methods, we propose a nonparametric kernel-regression weighting approach that allows maximum flexibility of the weighting parameters.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods JEL Code(s): C, C1, C14, C5, C53, E, E2, E27

• Fractional Cointegration and the Demand for M1

  Staff Working Paper 2000-13 Greg Tkacz

  Using wavelets, the author estimates the fractional order of integration of a common long-run money-demand relationship whose parameters are obtained from a full-information maximum-likelihood procedure.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods, Monetary aggregates JEL Code(s): C, C1, C13, E, E4, E41

• Non-Parametric and Neural Network Models of Inflation Changes

  Staff Working Paper 2000-7 Greg Tkacz

  Previous studies have shown that interest rate yield spreads contain useful information about future changes in inflation. However, such studies have for the most part focused on linear models, ignoring potential non-linearities between interest rates and inflation.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Economic models, Inflation and prices JEL Code(s): C, C5, C51, E, E3, E31

• Estimating the Fractional Order of Integration of Interest Rates Using a Wavelet OLS Estimator

  Staff Working Paper 2000-5 Greg Tkacz

  The debate on the order of integration of interest rates has long focused on the I(1) versus I(0) distinction. In this paper, we use instead the wavelet OLS estimator of Jensen (1999) to estimate the fractional integration parameters of several interest rates for the United States and Canada from 1948 to 1999.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods, Interest rates JEL Code(s): C, C1, C13, E, E4, E43

• Forecasting GDP Growth Using Artificial Neural Networks

  Staff Working Paper 1999-3 Greg Tkacz, Sarah Hu

  Financial and monetary variables have long been known to contain useful leading information regarding economic activity. In this paper, the authors wish to determine whether the forecasting performance of such variables can be improved using neural network models. The main findings are that, at the 1-quarter forecasting horizon, neural networks yield no significant forecast improvements. […]

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods, Monetary and financial indicators JEL Code(s): C, C4, C45, E, E3, E37, E4, E44

• Predicting Canadian Recessions Using Financial Variables: A Probit Approach

  Staff Working Paper 1998-5 Joseph Atta-Mensah, Greg Tkacz

  This paper examines the ability of a number of financial variables to predict Canadian recessions. Regarding methodology, we follow closely the technique employed by Estrella and Mishkin (1998), who use a probit model to predict U.S. recessions up to eight quarters in advance. Our main finding is that the spread between the yield on Canadian […]

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Business fluctuations and cycles, Interest rates JEL Code(s): E, E3, E32, E4, E43

• The Term Structure and Real Activity in Canada

  Staff Working Paper 1994-3 Barry Cozier, Greg Tkacz

  This paper examines the predictive content of the term structure of interest rates for economic activity in Canada. Recent papers for the United States and other countries find that the slope of the term structure is a very good predictor of output growth.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Interest rates, Monetary and financial indicators