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The term structure of credit spreads and business cycle in Japan

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  • Okimoto, Tatsuyoshi
  • Takaoka, Sumiko

Abstract

This paper investigates the usefulness of the term structure of credit spreads to predict the business cycle in Japan. Our analyses provide clear evidence that the term structure of credit spreads has more predictive power than the government bond yield. Specifically, the paper shows that the credit spread curve of medium-grade corporate bonds has more useful information than the government bond yield curve for predicting the business cycle. However, our results indicate that the increase in the BBB-rated credit spread is associated with future economic expansion, contradicting the theoretical prediction in the existing literature. Our Markov-switching analysis demonstrates that this peculiar relationship holds only during the global financial crisis regime, and the 1-year government bond yield and the term spread of A-rated credit spread information have significant predictive power for the business cycle, regardless of the economic state.

Suggested Citation

  • Okimoto, Tatsuyoshi & Takaoka, Sumiko, 2017. "The term structure of credit spreads and business cycle in Japan," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 27-36.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jjieco:v:45:y:2017:i:c:p:27-36
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jjie.2017.06.001
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    Cited by:

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    3. Juan Laborda & Sonia Ruano & Ignacio Zamanillo, 2023. "Multi-Country and Multi-Horizon GDP Forecasting Using Temporal Fusion Transformers," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 11(12), pages 1-26, June.
    4. Satoshi Tezuka & Yoichi Matsubayashi, 2018. "Credit Spread, Financial Market and Real Activities under Financial Instability: Empirical Evidence with MS-SBVAR," Discussion Papers 1812, Graduate School of Economics, Kobe University.
    5. Okimoto, Tatsuyoshi & Takaoka, Sumiko, 2020. "No-arbitrage determinants of credit spread curves under the unconventional monetary policy regime in Japan," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    6. Takeshi Kobayashi, 2021. "Common Factors in the Term Structure of Credit Spreads and Predicting the Macroeconomy in Japan," IJFS, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-12, April.
    7. Felipe, Jesus & Estrada, Gemma, 2020. "What happened to the world's potential growth after the 2008–2009 global financial crisis?," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 56(C).
    8. Koichiro Moriya & Akihiko Noda, 2023. "On the Time-Varying Structure of the Arbitrage Pricing Theory using the Japanese Sector Indices," Papers 2305.05998, arXiv.org, revised Mar 2024.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Business cycle; Corporate bond spreads; Government bond yields; Markov-switching model;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • E43 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Interest Rates: Determination, Term Structure, and Effects
    • E44 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Financial Markets and the Macroeconomy
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates

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