In this paper, we investigate the implications of the two concepts of asymmetry defined by Sichel (1993) - deepness and steepness - for first-order autoregressive processes with a Markov-switching intercept. In order to do so, we derive the two required formulas determining the coefficient of...

In this paper we propose exact likelihood-based mean-variance efficiency tests of the market portfolio in the context of Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM), allowing for a wide class of error distributions which include normality as a special case. These tests are developed in the framework of...

In this paper, we use a modified concept of Granger-(non)causality in reconsidering the negative correlation between stock returns and inflation known in the literature as stock return-inflation puzzle. Based on the quarterly data for Germany including stock returns, inflation rates and growth...

This paper provides a review of the literature on unit roots and cointegration in panels where the time dimension (T), and the cross section dimension (N) are relatively large. It distinguishes between the first generation tests developed on the assumption of the cross section independence, and...

Since Mandelbrot's seminal work (1963), alpha-stable distributions with infinite variance have been regarded as a more realistic distributional assumption than the normal distribution for some economic variables, especially financial data. After providing a brief survey of theoretical results on...

First and higher order digits in data sets of natural and socio-economic processes often follow a distribution called Benford's law. This phenomenon has been used in many business and scientific applications, especially in fraud detection for financial data. In this paper, we analyse whether...

Macroeconomic risk assessments play an important role in the forecasts of many institutions. However, to the best of our knowledge their performance has not been investigated yet. In this work, we study the Bank of England?s risk forecasts for inflation. We find that these forecasts do not...

From time to time, economies undergo far-reaching structural changes. In this paper we investigate the consequences of structural breaks in the factor loadings for the specification and estimation of factor models based on principal components and suggest test procedures for structural breaks....

Macroeconomic risk assessments play an important role in the forecasts of many institutions. A risk forecast is related to the potential asymmetry of the forecast density. In this work, we investigate how the optimality of such risk forecasts can be tested. We find that the Pearson mode skewness...

Surveying the forecasting practice of several central banks, we find that all these banks issue statements about risks to their macroeconomic forecasts. Often the balance of these risks is assessed as well. Upward [downward] risks to the forecast commonly imply that the outturn is expected to...