Abstract (Translated):
Our paper examines the accuracy of growth and inflation forecasts for 19 countries, published by the International Monetary Fund, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, Germany's Joint Diagnosis, or FERI, a private German forecaster, during 2001-2015. Despite dismal accuracy in absolute terms and only slightly better accuracy in relative terms, particularly concerning turning points, the forecasts show surprising similarities, especially regarding forecast revisions and the influence of US and German forecasts on forecasts in other countries. On average, the forecast record of the four institutions is also quite similar, with minor differences attributable to different forecast production dates. We found no evidence of so-called 'home advantages' for the institutions. In all, our results do not differ much from findings for earlier periods, which suggests that progress with forecasting growth and inflation has been slight.