Improving the Estimation and Predictions of Small Time Series Models

A new approach is developed for improving the point estimation and predictions of para-metric time-series models. The method targets performance criteria such as estimation bias, root mean squared error, variance, or prediction error, and produces closed-form es-timators focused towards these targets via a computational approximation method. This is done for an autoregression coefficient, for the mean reversion parameter in Vasicek and CIR diffusion models, for the Binomial thinning parameter in integer-valued autoregres-sive (INAR) models, and for predictions from a CIR model. The success of the prediction targeting approach is shown in Monte Carlo simulations and in out-of-sample forecasting of the US Federal Funds rate.