A Non-standard Empirical Likelihood for Time Series

Standard blockwise empirical likelihood (BEL) for stationary, weakly dependent time series requires specifying a fixed block length as a tuning parameter for setting confidence regions. This aspect can be difficult and impacts coverage accuracy. As an alternative, this paper proposes a new version of BEL based on a simple, though non-standard, data-blocking rule which uses a data block of every possible length. Consequently, the method involves no block selection and is also anticipated to exhibit better coverage performance. Its non-standard blocking scheme, however, induces non-standard asymptotics and requires a significantly different development compared to standard BEL. We establish the large-sample distribution of log-ratio statistics from the new BEL method for calibrating confidence regions for mean or smooth function parameters of time series. This limit law is not the usual chi-square one, but is distribution-free and can be reproduced through straightforward simulations. Numerical studies indicate that the proposed method generally exhibits better coverage accuracy than standard BEL.