Financial analysts typically estimate volatilities and correlations from monthly or higher frequency returns when determining the optimal composition of a portfolio. Although it is widely acknowledged that these measures are not necessarily stationary across samples, most analysts assume...

We analyze the properties of various methods for bias-correcting parameter estimates in both stationary and non-stationary vector autoregressive models. First, we show that two analytical bias formulas from the existing literature are in fact identical. Next, based on a detailed simulation...

The structural rate of unemployment and associated non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment (the NAIRU) are of major importance to the analysis of macro and structural economic developments, although in practice these concepts are not well defined and there is considerable uncertainty and...

Economists often seek to estimate unobserved variables, representing “equilibrium” or “expected” values of economic variables, as benchmarks against which observed, realised values of these variables may be evaluated. Such comparisons are often used as economic policy indicators, for...

This paper extends the canonical model of epidemiology, SIRD model, to allow for time varying parameters for real-time measurement of the stance of the COVID-19 pandemic. Time variation in model parameters is captured using the generalized autoregressive score modelling structure designed for...

In the last few years, the growth in the amount of economic and financial data available has prompted econometricians to develop or adapt new methods enabling them to summarise efficiently the information contained in large databases. Of these methods, dynamic factor models have seen rapid...

This paper models cyclical behaviour in property crime series (burglary and theft) in relation to the macroeconomic activity indicators in England andWales in the period from 1955 to 2001. Using unobserved components (UC) time series models, univariate time series analysis suggests that recorded...

Empirical observations raise interesting questions regarding the sources of the excessive volatility in the R&D sector as well as the nature of the relation between the sector and aggregate fluctuations. Using US data for the period 1959–2007, we identify sectoral technology and capital...

We evaluate the classical Cox, Ingersoll and Ross (1985) (CIR) model using data on LIBOR, swap rates and caps and swaptions. With three factors the CIR model is able to fit the term structure of LIBOR and swap rates rather well. The model is able to match the hump shaped unconditional term...