IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ecb/ecbwps/2006633.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Nowcasting GDP and inflation: the real-time informational content of macroeconomic data releases

Author

Listed:
  • Giannone, Domenico
  • Reichlin, Lucrezia
  • Small, David H.

Abstract

This paper formalizes the process of updating the nowcast and forecast on output and inflation as new releases of data become available. The marginal contribution of a particular release for the value of the signal and its precision is evaluated by computing "news" on the basis of an evolving conditioning information set. The marginal contribution is then split into what is due to timeliness of information and what is due to economic content. We find that the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia surveys have a large marginal impact on the nowcast of both inflation variables and real variables and this effect is larger than that of the Employment Report. When we control for timeliness of the releases, the effect of hard data becomes sizeable. Prices and quantities affect the precision of the estimates of inflation while GDP is only affected by real variables and interest rates. JEL Classification: E52, C33, C53

Suggested Citation

  • Giannone, Domenico & Reichlin, Lucrezia & Small, David H., 2006. "Nowcasting GDP and inflation: the real-time informational content of macroeconomic data releases," Working Paper Series 633, European Central Bank.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecb:ecbwps:2006633
    Note: 93468
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ecb.europa.eu//pub/pdf/scpwps/ecbwp633.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Danny Quah & Thomas J. Sargent, 1993. "A Dynamic Index Model for Large Cross Sections," NBER Chapters, in: Business Cycles, Indicators, and Forecasting, pages 285-310, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Martin D. D. Evans, 2005. "Where Are We Now? Real-Time Estimates of the Macroeconomy," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 1(2), September.
    3. Catherine Doz & Domenico Giannone & Lucrezia Reichlin, 2012. "A Quasi–Maximum Likelihood Approach for Large, Approximate Dynamic Factor Models," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 94(4), pages 1014-1024, November.
    4. Lippi, Marco & Reichlin, Lucrezia & Hallin, Marc & Forni, Mario & Altissimo, Filippo & Cristadoro, Riccardo & Veronese, Giovanni & Bassanetti, Antonio, 2001. "EuroCOIN: A Real Time Coincident Indicator of the Euro Area Business Cycle," CEPR Discussion Papers 3108, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. 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.
    6. Forni, Mario & Giannone, Domenico & Lippi, Marco & Reichlin, Lucrezia, 2009. "Opening The Black Box: Structural Factor Models With Large Cross Sections," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 25(5), pages 1319-1347, October.
    7. Bernanke, Ben S. & Boivin, Jean, 2003. "Monetary policy in a data-rich environment," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(3), pages 525-546, April.
    8. Mario Forni & Marc Hallin & Marco Lippi & Lucrezia Reichlin, 2000. "The Generalized Dynamic-Factor Model: Identification And Estimation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 82(4), pages 540-554, November.
    9. Forni, Mario & Reichlin, Lucrezia, 2001. "Federal policies and local economies: Europe and the US," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 109-134, January.
    10. James H. Stock & Mark W. Watson, 1989. "New Indexes of Coincident and Leading Economic Indicators," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1989, Volume 4, pages 351-409, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Boivin, Jean & Ng, Serena, 2006. "Are more data always better for factor analysis?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 132(1), pages 169-194, May.
    12. Jushan Bai, 2003. "Inferential Theory for Factor Models of Large Dimensions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(1), pages 135-171, January.
    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. Giannone, Domenico & Reichlin, Lucrezia & Small, David, 2008. "Nowcasting: The real-time informational content of macroeconomic data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(4), pages 665-676, May.
    2. Stock, J.H. & Watson, M.W., 2016. "Dynamic Factor Models, Factor-Augmented Vector Autoregressions, and Structural Vector Autoregressions in Macroeconomics," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 415-525, Elsevier.
    3. Karim Barhoumi & Olivier Darné & Laurent Ferrara, 2014. "Dynamic factor models: A review of the literature," OECD Journal: Journal of Business Cycle Measurement and Analysis, OECD Publishing, Centre for International Research on Economic Tendency Surveys, vol. 2013(2), pages 73-107.
    4. Kihwan Kim & Norman Swanson, 2013. "Diffusion Index Model Specification and Estimation Using Mixed Frequency Datasets," Departmental Working Papers 201315, Rutgers University, Department of Economics.
    5. Rua, António, 2017. "A wavelet-based multivariate multiscale approach for forecasting," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 581-590.
    6. Doz, Catherine & Giannone, Domenico & Reichlin, Lucrezia, 2011. "A two-step estimator for large approximate dynamic factor models based on Kalman filtering," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 164(1), pages 188-205, September.
    7. Catherine Doz & Domenico Giannone & Lucrezia Reichlin, 2012. "A Quasi–Maximum Likelihood Approach for Large, Approximate Dynamic Factor Models," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 94(4), pages 1014-1024, November.
    8. Matteo Barigozzi & Matteo Luciani, 2019. "Quasi Maximum Likelihood Estimation and Inference of Large Approximate Dynamic Factor Models via the EM algorithm," Papers 1910.03821, arXiv.org, revised Sep 2024.
    9. Zirogiannis, Nikolaos & Tripodis, Yorghos, 2013. "A Generalized Dynamic Factor Model for Panel Data: Estimation with a Two-Cycle Conditional Expectation-Maximization Algorithm," Working Paper Series 142752, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Department of Resource Economics.
    10. Matteo Luciani & Lorenzo Ricci, 2014. "Nowcasting Norway," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 10(4), pages 215-248, December.
    11. Bańbura, Marta & Giannone, Domenico & Modugno, Michele & Reichlin, Lucrezia, 2013. "Now-Casting and the Real-Time Data Flow," Handbook of Economic Forecasting, in: G. Elliott & C. Granger & A. Timmermann (ed.), Handbook of Economic Forecasting, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 195-237, Elsevier.
    12. Catherine Doz & Peter Fuleky, 2019. "Dynamic Factor Models," Working Papers 2019-4, University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization, University of Hawaii at Manoa.
    13. Poncela, Pilar & Ruiz, Esther & Miranda, Karen, 2021. "Factor extraction using Kalman filter and smoothing: This is not just another survey," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 1399-1425.
    14. Forni, Mario & Cavicchioli, Maddalena & Lippi, Marco & Zaffaroni, Paolo, 2016. "Eigenvalue Ratio Estimators for the Number of Common Factors," CEPR Discussion Papers 11440, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    15. Laurent Ferrara & Dominique Guégan & Patrick Rakotomarolahy, 2010. "GDP nowcasting with ragged-edge data: a semi-parametric modeling," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(1-2), pages 186-199.
    16. Smets, Frank & Beyer, Robert C. M., 2015. "Labour market adjustments in Europe and the US: How different?," Working Paper Series 1767, European Central Bank.
    17. Nikolaos Zirogiannis & Yorghos Tripodis, 2013. "A Generalized Dynamic Factor Model for Panel Data: Estimation with a Two-Cycle Conditional Expectation-Maximization Algorithm," Working Papers 2013-1, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Department of Resource Economics.
    18. Karim Barhoumi & Olivier Darné & Laurent Ferrara, 2010. "Are disaggregate data useful for factor analysis in forecasting French GDP?," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(1-2), pages 132-144.
    19. Hanan Naser, 2015. "Estimating and forecasting Bahrain quarterly GDP growth using simple regression and factor-based methods," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 49(2), pages 449-479, September.
    20. Eickmeier, Sandra, 2005. "Common stationary and non-stationary factors in the euro area analyzed in a large-scale factor model," Discussion Paper Series 1: Economic Studies 2005,02, Deutsche Bundesbank.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    factor model; forecasting; Large Data Sets; monetary policy; news; Real Time Data;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • C33 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Models with Panel Data; Spatio-temporal Models
    • C53 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Forecasting and Prediction Models; Simulation Methods

    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:2006633. 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.