We study the dynamics of inflation persistence in 45 countries for the period 1960-2008. We use a nonparametric unit root test robust to nonlinearities, error distributions, structural breaks and outliers, many of them typical features of inflation data, and a test for multiple changes in...

Empirical research on the degree and stability of inflation persistence in the US has produced mixed results: some suggest high and unchanged persistence during the last few decades, while others argue in favor of a decline in persistence since the early 1980s. We contribute to this debate by...

In this paper I discuss the estimation of the process governing the structural shocks (or wedges) to a DSGE model, arguing that a well-specified model would satisfy certain sets of moment conditions. Based on tests for overidentifying restrictions, I compare three specifications of the Taylor...

In this paper we report results on inflation persistence using 79 inflation series covering the EU countries, the euro area and the US for five different inflation variables. The picture that emerges is one of moderate inflation persistence across the board. In particular we find euro area...

This paper deals with cryptocurrency bubbles. First, it points out that a number of recent papers on cryptocurrency bubbles are awed due to an insufficient consideration of the fundamental value of cryptocurrencies. As even fiat money is said to exhibit features of bubbles, the same applies to...

We test for state-dependent bias in the European Central Bank's inflation projections. We show that the ECB tends to underpredict when the observed inflation rate at the time of forecasting is higher than an estimated threshold of 1.8%. The bias is most pronounced at intermediate forecasting...

In this paper we report results on inflation persistence using 79 inflation series covering the EU countries, the euro area and the US for five different inflation variables. The picture that emerges is one of moderate inflation persistence across the board. In particular we find euro area...

We test for bias and efficiency of the ECB inflation forecasts using a confidential dataset of ECB macroeconomic quarterly projections. We investigate whether the properties of the forecasts depend on the level of inflation, by distinguishing whether the inflation observed by the ECB at the time...

We test for bias and efficiency of the ECB inflation forecasts using a confidential dataset of ECB macroeconomic quarterly projections. We investigate whether the properties of the forecasts depend on the level of inflation, by distinguishing whether the inflation observed by the ECB at the time...

The econometrics literature contains a variety of two-sided tests for unknown breakpoints in time-series models with one or more parameters. This paper derives an analogous one-sided test that takes into account the direction of the change for a single parameter. In particular, we propose a sup...