The paper investigates the sources of macroeconomic forecast errors in Germany. The predictions of the so-called "six leading" research institutes are analyzed. The forecast errors are discussed within an aggregate demand/supply scheme. Structural Vector Autoregressive Models are estimated to...

We use a machine-learning approach known as Boosted Regression Trees (BRT) to reexamine the usefulness of selected leading indicators for predicting recessions. We estimate the BRT approach on German data and study the relative importance of the indicators and their marginal effects on the...

Based on monthly data covering the period from 1987 to 2019, we analyse whether cross-sectional moments of stock market returns may provide information about the future position of the German business cycle. We apply in-sample forecasting regressions with and without leading indicators as...

This paper elaborates on the link between financial market volatility and real economic activity. Using monthly data for Germany from 1968 to 1998, we specify GARCH models to capture the variability of stock market prices, of the real exchange rate, and of a long-term and of a short-term rate of...

The process of European integration has gained considerable momentum during the past couple of years. This paper provides an assessment of the degree of integration of both the accession states of central and eastern Europe and of the pre-ins for monetary union with respect to Germany. Using...

The process of European integration has gained considerable momentum during the past couple of years. This paper provides an assessment of the degree of integration of both the accession states of central and eastern Europe and of the pre-ins for monetary union with respect to Germany. Using...

We discuss properties of alternatives or complements to GDP as a measure of welfare at business cycle frequencies. We argue that these figures are not useful to measure the welfare costs of business cycles. First, data is not available at an appropriate quality and frequency. Second, since the...

The paper analyses reasons for departures from strong rationality of growth and inflation forecasts based on annual observations from 1963 to 2004. We rely on forecasts from the joint forecast of the so-called "six leading" forecasting institutions in Germany and argue that violations of the...

Based on a panel of annual data for 17 growth and inflation forecasts from 14 institutions for Germany, we analyse forecast accuracy for the periods before and after the Great Recession, including measures of directional change accuracy based on Receiver Operating Curves (ROC).We find only small...