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Unit Root Tests Are Useful for Selecting Forecasting Models

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Author Info
Francis X. Diebold
Lutz Kilian

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Abstract

We study the usefulness of root tests as diagnostic tools for selecting forecasting models. Difference stationary and trend stationary models of economic and financial time series often imply very different predictions, so deciding which model to use is tremendously important for applied forecasters. Forecasters face three choices: always difference the data, never difference, or use a unit-root pretest. We characterize the predictive loss of these strategies for the canonical AR(1) process with trend, focusing on the effects of sample size, forecast horizon, and degree of persistence. We show that pretesting routinely improves forecast accuracy relative to forecasts from models in differences, and we give conditions under which pretesting is likely to improve forecast accuracy relative to forecasts from models in levels.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 6928.

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Date of creation: Feb 1999
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Publication status: published as Diebold, Francis X. and Lutz Kilian. "Unit-Root Tests Are Useful For Selecting Forecasting Models," Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, 2000, v18(3,Jul), 265-273.
Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:6928

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C1 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: General

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Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Lutz Kilian, 1998. "Small-Sample Confidence Intervals For Impulse Response Functions," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 80(2), pages 218-230, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Christiano, Lawrence J. & Eichenbaum, Martin, 1990. "Unit roots in real GNP: Do we know, and do we care?," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32, pages 7-61. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. Rudebusch, Glenn D, 1993. "The Uncertain Unit Root in Real GNP," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(1), pages 264-72, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Ng, S. & Perron, P., 1994. "Unit Root Tests ARMA Models with Data Dependent Methods for the Selection of the Truncation Lag," Cahiers de recherche 9423, Centre interuniversitaire de recherche en économie quantitative, CIREQ.
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  5. John Y. Campbell & Pierre Perron, 1991. "Pitfalls and Opportunities: What Macroeconomists Should Know About Unit Roots," NBER Technical Working Papers 0100, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Eugene Canjels & Mark W. Watson, 1997. "Estimating Deterministic Trends In The Presence Of Serially Correlated Errors," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 79(2), pages 184-200, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Zivot, Eric & Andrews, Donald W K, 1992. "Further Evidence on the Great Crash, the Oil-Price Shock, and the Unit-Root Hypothesis," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 10(3), pages 251-70, July.
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  8. Peter F. Christoffersen & Francis X. Diebold, 1997. "Cointegration and Long-Horizon Forecasting," NBER Technical Working Papers 0217, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  9. Elliott, Graham & Rothenberg, Thomas J & Stock, James H, 1996. "Efficient Tests for an Autoregressive Unit Root," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(4), pages 813-36, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Leybourne, S J & McCabe, B P M, 1994. "A Consistent Test for a Unit Root," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 12(2), pages 157-66, April.
  11. Stock, James H., 1986. "Unit roots, structural breaks and trends," Handbook of Econometrics, in: R. F. Engle & D. McFadden (ed.), Handbook of Econometrics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 46, pages 2739-2841 Elsevier. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  12. Diebold, Francis X & Senhadji, Abdelhak S, 1996. "The Uncertain Unit Root in Real GNP: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(5), pages 1291-98, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. Franses, Philip Hans & Kleibergen, Frank, 1996. "Unit roots in the Nelson-Plosser data: Do they matter for forecasting?," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 12(2), pages 283-288, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. Andrews, Donald W K & Chen, Hong-Yuan, 1994. "Approximately Median-Unbiased Estimation of Autoregressive Models," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 12(2), pages 187-204, April.
  15. Mehmet Caner & Lutz Kilian, 1999. "Size Distortions of Tests of the Null Hypothesis of Stationarity: Evidence and Implications for Applied Work," Computing in Economics and Finance 1999 511, Society for Computational Economics. [Downloadable!]
  16. Stock, James H, 1996. "VAR, Error Correction and Pretest Forecasts at Long Horizons," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 58(4), pages 685-701, November.
  17. James H. Stock & Mark W. Watson, 1998. "A Comparison of Linear and Nonlinear Univariate Models for Forecasting Macroeconomic Time Series," NBER Working Papers 6607, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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