The World Economic Outlook (WEO) is a key source of forecasts of global economic conditions. It is therefore important to review the performance of these forecasts against both actual outcomes and alternative forecasts. This paper conducts a series of statistical tests to evaluate the quality of...

Intro -- Contents -- I. INTRODUCTION AND SUMMARY -- II. DESCRIPTION OF WEO DATASET -- III. PROPERTIES OF OPTIMAL FORECASTS -- IV. EMPIRICAL RESULTS -- V. ANALYSIS OF STATISTICAL SIGNIFICANCE -- VI. CAN THE WEO FORECAST ERRORS BE PREDICTED? -- VII. DIRECTIONAL ACCURACY -- VIII. REVISIONS FROM...

This paper examines the performance of World Economic Outlook (WEO) growth forecasts for 2004-17. Short-term real GDP growth forecasts over that period exhibit little bias, and their accuracy is broadly similar to those of Consensus Economics forecasts. By contrast, two- to five-year ahead WEO...

The World Economic Outlook (WEO) is a key source of forecasts of global economic conditions. It is therefore important to review the performance of these forecasts against both actual outcomes and alternative forecasts. This paper conducts a series of statistical tests to evaluate the quality of...