Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/153888 
Year of Publication: 
2012
Series/Report no.: 
ECB Working Paper No. 1455
Publisher: 
European Central Bank (ECB), Frankfurt a. M.
Abstract: 
Reliable and timely information about current economic conditions is crucial for policy makers and expectations formation. This paper demonstrates the efficacy of the Survey of Professional Forecasters (SPF) and the Purchasing Manager Indices (PMI) in anticipating US real economic activity. We conduct a fully-fledged real-time out-ofsample forecasting exercise linking these surveys to US GDP and industrial production growth over a long sample period. We find that both indicators convey valuable information for assessing current economic conditions. The SPF clearly outperforms the PMI in forecasting GDP growth, while it performs quite poorly in anticipating industrial production growth. Combining the information included in both surveys further improves the accuracy of both, the PMI and the SPF-based forecast.
Subjects: 
business cycle
forecasting
PMI
Real Time Data
US
JEL: 
E37
E47
C22
C53
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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