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Nowcasting global economic growth: A factor‐augmented mixed‐frequency approach

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  • Laurent Ferrara
  • Clément Marsilli

Abstract

Assessing accurately global economic conditions is a great challenge for economists. The International Monetary Fund proposes within its periodic World Economic Outlook report a measure of the global GDP annual growth, that is generally considered as the benchmark nowcast by macroeconomists. In this paper, we put forward an alternative approach to provide monthly nowcasts of the annual global growth rate. Our approach builds on a Factor‐Augmented MIxed DAta Sampling (FA‐MIDAS) model that enables: (i) to account for a large monthly database including various countries and sectors of the global economy and (ii) to nowcast a low‐frequency macroeconomic variable using higher frequency information. Pseudo‐real‐time results over the period 2010–16 show that this approach provides reliable and timely nowcasts of the world GDP annual growth on a monthly basis.

Suggested Citation

  • Laurent Ferrara & Clément Marsilli, 2019. "Nowcasting global economic growth: A factor‐augmented mixed‐frequency approach," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(3), pages 846-875, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:worlde:v:42:y:2019:i:3:p:846-875
    DOI: 10.1111/twec.12708
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    As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
    1. Guest Contribution: “Nowcasting Global GDP Growth”
      by Menzie Chinn in Econbrowser on 2015-03-12 09:56:18

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    Cited by:

    1. Baumeister, Christiane & Guérin, Pierre, 2021. "A comparison of monthly global indicators for forecasting growth," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 1276-1295.
    2. Camacho, Maximo & Martinez-Martin, Jaime, 2015. "Monitoring the world business cycle," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 617-625.
    3. Garnitz, Johanna & Lehmann, Robert & Wohlrabe, Klaus, 2019. "Forecasting GDP all over the world using leading indicators based on comprehensive survey data," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 51(54), pages 5802-5816.
    4. Ferrara , L. & Marsilli, C., 2016. "Nowcasting global economic growth," Rue de la Banque, Banque de France, issue 23, April..
    5. Francesco Ravazzolo & Joaquin Vespignani, 2020. "World steel production: A new monthly indicator of global real economic activity," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 53(2), pages 743-766, May.
    6. Katja Heinisch & Axel Lindner, 2019. "For how long do IMF forecasts of world economic growth stay up-to-date?," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 26(3), pages 255-260, February.
    7. Laurent Ferrara & Anna Simoni, 2023. "When are Google Data Useful to Nowcast GDP? An Approach via Preselection and Shrinkage," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(4), pages 1188-1202, October.
    8. M. Ayhan Kose & Naotaka Sugawara & Marco E. Terrones, 2020. "Global Recessions," Working Papers 162, Peruvian Economic Association.
    9. Chatelais, Nicolas & Stalla-Bourdillon, Arthur & Chinn, Menzie D., 2023. "Forecasting real activity using cross-sectoral stock market information," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    10. Jack Fosten & Shaoni Nandi, 2023. "Nowcasting from cross‐sectionally dependent panels," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 38(6), pages 898-919, September.
    11. Denisa BANULESCU-RADU & Laurent FERRARA & Clément MARSILLI, 2019. "Prévoir la volatilité d’un actif financier à l’aide d’un modèle à mélange de fréquences," LEO Working Papers / DR LEO 2710, Orleans Economics Laboratory / Laboratoire d'Economie d'Orleans (LEO), University of Orleans.
    12. Knut Are Aastveit & Tuva Marie Fastbø & Eleonora Granziera & Kenneth Sæterhagen Paulsen & Kjersti Næss Torstensen, 2020. "Nowcasting Norwegian household consumption with debit card transaction data," Working Paper 2020/17, Norges Bank.
    13. C. Marsilli, 2014. "Variable Selection in Predictive MIDAS Models," Working papers 520, Banque de France.
    14. Mahmut Gunay, 2018. "Nowcasting Annual Turkish GDP Growth with MIDAS," CBT Research Notes in Economics 1810, Research and Monetary Policy Department, Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey.
    15. Michael Zhemkov, 2021. "Nowcasting Russian GDP using forecast combination approach," International Economics, CEPII research center, issue 168, pages 10-24.
    16. Nicolas Chatelais & Menzie Chinn & Arthur Stalla-Bourdillon, 2022. "Macroeconomic Forecasting Using Filtered Signals from a Stock Market Cross Section," Working papers 903, Banque de France.
    17. Stankevich, Ivan, 2020. "Comparison of macroeconomic indicators nowcasting methods: Russian GDP case," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 59, pages 113-127.
    18. Luciano Campos & Danilo Leiva-León & Steven Zapata- Álvarez, 2022. "Latin American Falls, Rebounds and Tail Risks," Borradores de Economia 1201, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
    19. Baumann, Ursel & Gomez-Salvador, Ramon & Seitz, Franz, 2019. "Detecting turning points in global economic activity," Working Paper Series 2310, European Central Bank.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • C53 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Forecasting and Prediction Models; Simulation Methods
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications

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