IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ecb/ecbwps/2004374.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

To aggregate or not to aggregate? Euro area inflation forecasting

Author

Listed:
  • Roma, Moreno
  • Skudelny, Frauke
  • Benalal, Nicholai
  • Diaz del Hoyo, Juan Luis
  • Landau, Bettina

Abstract

In this paper we investigate whether the forecast of the HICP components (indirect approach) improves upon the forecast of overall HICP (direct approach) and whether the aggregation of country forecasts improves upon the forecast of the euro-area as a whole, considering the four largest euro area countries. The direct approach provides clearly better results than the indirect approach for 12 and 18 steps ahead for the overall HICP, while for shorter horizons the results are mixed. For the euro area HICP excluding unprocessed food and energy(HICPX), the indirect forecast outperforms the direct whereas the differences are only marginal for the countries. The aggregation of country forecasts does not seem to improve upon the forecast of the euro area HICP and HICPX. This result has however to be taken with caution as differences appear to be rather small and due to the limited country coverage. JEL Classification: C11, C32, C53, E31, E37

Suggested Citation

  • Roma, Moreno & Skudelny, Frauke & Benalal, Nicholai & Diaz del Hoyo, Juan Luis & Landau, Bettina, 2004. "To aggregate or not to aggregate? Euro area inflation forecasting," Working Paper Series 374, European Central Bank.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecb:ecbwps:2004374
    Note: 337417
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ecb.europa.eu//pub/pdf/scpwps/ecbwp374.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Meyler, Aidan & Kenny, Geoff & Quinn, Terry, 1998. "Forecasting irish inflation using ARIMA models," MPRA Paper 11359, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. repec:onb:oenbwp:y::i:73:b:1 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Marcellino, Massimiliano & Stock, James H. & Watson, Mark W., 2003. "Macroeconomic forecasting in the Euro area: Country specific versus area-wide information," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 1-18, February.
    4. Mr. Toshitaka Sekine, 2001. "Modeling and Forecasting Inflation in Japan," IMF Working Papers 2001/082, International Monetary Fund.
    5. Ard Reijer & Peter Vlaar, 2006. "Forecasting Inflation: An Art as Well as a Science!," De Economist, Springer, vol. 154(1), pages 19-40, March.
    6. Hubrich, Kirstin, 2005. "Forecasting euro area inflation: Does aggregating forecasts by HICP component improve forecast accuracy?," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 119-136.
    7. Jonas D. M. Fisher & Chin Te Liu & Ruilin Zhou, 2002. "When can we forecast inflation?," Economic Perspectives, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, vol. 26(Q I), pages 32-44.
    8. Kenny, Geoff & Meyler, Aidan & Quinn, Terry, 1998. "Bayesian VAR Models for Forecasting Irish Inflation," MPRA Paper 11360, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Thomas Doan & Robert B. Litterman & Christopher A. Sims, 1983. "Forecasting and Conditional Projection Using Realistic Prior Distributions," NBER Working Papers 1202, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Friedrich Fritzer & Gabriel Moser & Johann Scharler, 2002. "Forecasting Austrian HICP and its Components using VAR and ARIMA Models," Working Papers 73, Oesterreichische Nationalbank (Austrian Central Bank).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. O. De Bandt & E. Michaux & C. Bruneau & A. Flageollet, 2007. "Forecasting inflation using economic indicators: the case of France," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(1), pages 1-22.
    2. Quinn, Terry & Kenny, Geoff & Meyler, Aidan, 1999. "Inflation Analysis: An Overview," Research Technical Papers 1/RT/99, Central Bank of Ireland.
    3. Marco Huwiler & Daniel Kaufmann, 2013. "Combining disaggregate forecasts for inflation: The SNB's ARIMA model," Economic Studies 2013-07, Swiss National Bank.
    4. Hendry, David F. & Hubrich, Kirstin, 2011. "Combining Disaggregate Forecasts or Combining Disaggregate Information to Forecast an Aggregate," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 29(2), pages 216-227.
    5. Duarte, Claudia & Rua, Antonio, 2007. "Forecasting inflation through a bottom-up approach: How bottom is bottom?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 941-953, November.
    6. Alex Ilek, 2007. "Aggregation versus Disaggregation - What can we learn from it?," Bank of Israel Working Papers 2007.02b, Bank of Israel.
    7. Andrejs Bessonovs & Olegs Krasnopjorovs, 2021. "Short-term inflation projections model and its assessment in Latvia," Baltic Journal of Economics, Baltic International Centre for Economic Policy Studies, vol. 21(2), pages 184-204.
    8. Vesna Karadzic & Bojan Pejovic, 2021. "Inflation Forecasting in the Western Balkans and EU: A Comparison of Holt-Winters, ARIMA and NNAR Models," The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal, Academy of Economic Studies - Bucharest, Romania, vol. 23(57), pages 517-517.
    9. Moser, Gabriel & Rumler, Fabio & Scharler, Johann, 2007. "Forecasting Austrian inflation," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 24(3), pages 470-480, May.
    10. Andreja Pufnik & Davor Kunovac, 2006. "Short-Term Forecasting of Inflation in Croatia with Seasonal ARIMA Processes," Working Papers 16, The Croatian National Bank, Croatia.
    11. Aron, Janine & Muellbauer, John, 2012. "Improving forecasting in an emerging economy, South Africa: Changing trends, long run restrictions and disaggregation," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 456-476.
    12. Chalmovianský, Jakub & Porqueddu, Mario & Sokol, Andrej, 2020. "Weigh(t)ing the basket: aggregate and component-based inflation forecasts for the euro area," Working Paper Series 2501, European Central Bank.
    13. Rünstler, Gerhard & Sédillot, Franck, 2003. "Short-term estimates of euro area real GDP by means of monthly data," Working Paper Series 276, European Central Bank.
    14. Ivan Kitov & Oleg Kitov, 2013. "Does Banque de France control inflation and unemployment?," Papers 1311.1097, arXiv.org.
    15. Brüggemann, Ralf & Lütkepohl, Helmut, 2013. "Forecasting contemporaneous aggregates with stochastic aggregation weights," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 60-68.
    16. Hyndman, Rob J. & Ahmed, Roman A. & Athanasopoulos, George & Shang, Han Lin, 2011. "Optimal combination forecasts for hierarchical time series," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 55(9), pages 2579-2589, September.
    17. Kirstin Hubrich & Guenter Beck & Massimiliano Marcellino, 2000. "Regional Inflation Dynamics within and across Euro Area Countries and a Comparison with the US," Regional and Urban Modeling 283600037, EcoMod.
    18. Jing Zeng, 2015. "Combining Country-Specific Forecasts when Forecasting Euro Area Macroeconomic Aggregates," Working Paper Series of the Department of Economics, University of Konstanz 2015-11, Department of Economics, University of Konstanz.
    19. Fabio Canova & Matteo Ciccarelli, 2002. "Panel Index Var Models: Specification, Estimation, Testing And Leading Indicators," Working Papers. Serie AD 2002-21, Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, S.A. (Ivie).
    20. Kenny, Geoff & Meyler, Aidan & Quinn, Terry, 1998. "Bayesian VAR Models for Forecasting Irish Inflation," Research Technical Papers 4/RT/98, Central Bank of Ireland.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Bayesian VARs; Forecasting short-term inflation; HICP sub-components/aggregation; model selection;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C11 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Bayesian Analysis: General
    • C32 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes; State Space Models
    • C53 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Forecasting and Prediction Models; Simulation Methods
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ecb:ecbwps:2004374. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Official Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/emieude.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.