Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/286559 
Year of Publication: 
2022
Citation: 
[Journal:] SERIEs - Journal of the Spanish Economic Association [ISSN:] 1869-4195 [Volume:] 13 [Issue:] 1 [Year:] 2022 [Pages:] 397-428
Publisher: 
Springer, Heidelberg
Abstract: 
Dynamic factor models (DFMs), which assume the existence of a small number of unobserved underlying factors common to a large number of variables, are very popular among empirical macroeconomists. Factors can be extracted using either nonparametric principal components or parametric Kalman filter and smoothing procedures, with the former being computationally simpler and robust against misspecification and the latter coping in a natural way with missing and mixed-frequency data, time-varying parameters, nonlinearities and non-stationarity, among many other stylized facts often observed in real systems of economic variables. This paper analyses the empirical consequences on factor estimation, in-sample predictions and out-of-sample forecasting of using alternative estimators of the DFM under various sources of potential misspecification. In particular, we consider factor extraction when assuming different number of factors and different factor dynamics. The factors are extracted from a popular data base of US macroeconomic variables, widely analyzed in the literature without consensus about the most appropriate model specification. We show that this lack of consensus is only marginally crucial when it comes to factor extraction, but it matters when the objective is out-of-sample forecasting.
Subjects: 
EM algorithm
Kalman filter
Macroeconomic forecasting
Principal components
State-space model
JEL: 
C32
C55
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by Logo
Document Type: 
Article

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