Exploiting the monthly data-flow in structural forecasting

This paper shows how and when it is possible to obtain a mapping from a quarterly DSGE model to a monthly specification that maintains the same economic restrictions and has real coefficients. We use this technique to derive the monthly counterpart of the Gali et al (2011) model. We then augment it with auxiliary macro indicators which, because of their timeliness, can be used to obtain a now-cast of the structural model. We show empirical results for the quarterly growth rate of GDP, the monthly unemployment rate and the welfare relevant output gap defined in Gali, Smets and Wouters (2011). Results show that the augmented monthly model does best for now-casting.