Spurious Periodicity in Inappropriately Detrended Time Series

Econometric analysis of time series data is frequently preceded by regression on time to remove a trent component in the date. The resulting residuals are then treated as a stationary series to which procedures requiring stationarity, such as spectral analysis, can be applied. The objective is often to investigate the dynamics of transitory movements in the systems, for example, in econometric models of the business cycle. When the data does consist of a deterministic function of time plus a stationary error then regression residuals will clearly be unbiased estimates of the stationary component. However, if the data is generated by (possibly repeated) summation of a satisfactory and inevitable process then the series cannot be expressed as a deterministic function of time plus a stationary deviation, even though a least squares trend line and the associated residuals can always be calculated for any given finite sample. In a recent paper, Chan, Hayya, and Ord (1977) hereafter CHO) were able to show that a residuals from linear regression of a realization of a random walk (the summation of a purely random series) on time have autocovariances which for given lag are a function of time and thereafter that the residuals are not stationary. Further, CHO established that the expected sample autocovariance function (the expected autocovariances for given lag averaged over the time interval of the sample) is a function of sample size as well as lag and therefore an artifact of the detrending procedure. This function is characterized by CHO in their figure 1 as being effectively linear in lag (although the exact function is a fifth degree polynomial) with the rate of decay from unity at the origin depending inversely on sample size.(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)