Lawrence R. Klein (September 14, 1920 – October 20, 2013), Nobel Laureate in Economic Sciences in 1980, was one of the leading figures in macro-econometric modeling. Although his contributions to forecasting using simultaneous equations macro models were very well known, his contributions to...

This paper studies the comparative predictive accuracy of forecasting methods using mixed-frequency data, as applied to nowcasting Philippine inflation, real GDP growth, and other related macroeconomic variables. It focuses on variations of mixed-frequency dynamic latent factor models (DFM for...

This paper studies macroeconomic forecasting and variable selection using a folded-concave penalized regression with a very large number of predictors. The penalized regression approach leads to sparse estimates of the regression coefficients, and is applicable even if the dimensionality of the...

In this paper we consider the value of Google Trends search data for nowcasting (and forecasting) GDP growth for a developed (U.S.) and emerging-market economy (Brazil). Our focus is on the marginal contribution of "Big Data" in the form of Google Trends data over and above that of traditional...

Commodity prices co-move, but the strength of this co-movement changes over time due to structural factors, like changing energy intensity in production and consumption as well as changing composition of underlying shocks. This paper explores whether econometric models that exploit this...

The prompt availability of information on the current state of the economy in real-time is required for prediction purposes and crucial for timely policy adjustment and economic decision-making. While important macroeconomic indicators are reported only quarterly and also published with...

We propose a Release-Augmented Dynamic Factor Model (RA-DFM) that allows to quantify the role of a country's data flow in nowcasting both early GDP releases, and subsequent revisions of official estimates. We use the RA-DFM to study UK GDP early revision rounds, and assemble a comprehensive and...

We propose a new data-rich environment model of the yield curve, the macroeconomy, monetary policies and effective exchange rates for a panel of 11 countries: the iDREAM. The endogenous variables are observable (short- and long-term interest rates, exchange rates) and latent factors (economic...

Common sense tells that historical data are more informative for the estimation of today's nowcasting models when observed in a similar economic state as today. We operationalise this intuition by proposing a state-based weighted estimation procedure of GDP nowcasting models, in which...

This paper outlines a method to forecast FX spot rates. The data set consists of the Bloomberg FX spot rates for emerging markets as defined by Bloomberg. The in-sample data set consisted of weekly FX spot rates for ten Emerging markets, from August 2013 to March 2019. The out sample spanned...