IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/openec/v20y2009i3p385-402.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Forecasting World Trade: Direct Versus “Bottom-Up” Approaches

Author

Listed:
  • Matthias Burgert
  • Stephane Dees

Abstract

In a globalised world economy, global factors have become increasingly important to explain trade flows at the expense of country-specific determinants. This paper shows empirically the superiority of direct forecasting methods, in which world trade is directly forecasted at the aggregate levels, relative to "bottom-up" approaches, where world trade results from an aggregation of country-specific forecasts. Factor models in particular prove rather accurate, where the factors summarise large-scale datasets relevant in the determination of trade flows. JEL Classification: C53, C32, E37, F17
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Matthias Burgert & Stephane Dees, 2009. "Forecasting World Trade: Direct Versus “Bottom-Up” Approaches," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 20(3), pages 385-402, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:openec:v:20:y:2009:i:3:p:385-402
    DOI: 10.1007/s11079-007-9068-y
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11079-007-9068-y
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11079-007-9068-y?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Forni, Mario & Hallin, Marc & Lippi, Marco & Reichlin, Lucrezia, 2005. "The Generalized Dynamic Factor Model: One-Sided Estimation and Forecasting," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 100, pages 830-840, September.
    2. Hendry, David & Hubrich, Kirstin, 2006. "Forecasting Economic Aggregates by Disaggregates," CEPR Discussion Papers 5485, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    3. George Kapetanios & Massimiliano Marcellino, 2003. "A Comparison of Estimation Methods for Dynamic Factor Models of Large Dimensions," Working Papers 489, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.
    4. Kwiatkowski, Denis & Phillips, Peter C. B. & Schmidt, Peter & Shin, Yongcheol, 1992. "Testing the null hypothesis of stationarity against the alternative of a unit root : How sure are we that economic time series have a unit root?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1-3), pages 159-178.
    5. Marcellino, Massimiliano & Stock, James H. & Watson, Mark W., 2006. "A comparison of direct and iterated multistep AR methods for forecasting macroeconomic time series," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 135(1-2), pages 499-526.
    6. West, Kenneth D., 2006. "Forecast Evaluation," Handbook of Economic Forecasting, in: G. Elliott & C. Granger & A. Timmermann (ed.), Handbook of Economic Forecasting, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 3, pages 99-134, Elsevier.
    7. Diebold, Francis X & Mariano, Roberto S, 2002. "Comparing Predictive Accuracy," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 20(1), pages 134-144, January.
    8. Keck, Alexander & Raubold, Alexander, 2006. "Forecasting trade," WTO Staff Working Papers ERSD-2006-05, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division.
    9. Mario Forni & Marc Hallin & Marco Lippi & Lucrezia Reichlin, 2000. "The Generalized Dynamic-Factor Model: Identification And Estimation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 82(4), pages 540-554, November.
    10. Stock, James H & Watson, Mark W, 2002. "Macroeconomic Forecasting Using Diffusion Indexes," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 20(2), pages 147-162, April.
    11. McCracken, Michael W., 2007. "Asymptotics for out of sample tests of Granger causality," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 140(2), pages 719-752, October.
    12. Nigel Pain & Annabelle Mourougane & Franck Sédillot & Laurence Le Fouler, 2005. "The New OECD International Trade Model," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 440, OECD Publishing.
    13. James H. Stock & Mark W. Watson, 1998. "Diffusion Indexes," NBER Working Papers 6702, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Marcellino, Massimiliano & Stock, James H. & Watson, Mark W., 2003. "Macroeconomic forecasting in the Euro area: Country specific versus area-wide information," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 1-18, February.
    15. Gerard van Welzenis & Wim Suyker, 2005. "Explanatory note on the CPB world trade series," CPB Memorandum 116, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    16. Gerard van Welzenis & Wim Suyker, 2005. "Explanatory note on the CPB world trade series," CPB Memorandum 116.rdf, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    17. G. Elliott & C. Granger & A. Timmermann (ed.), 2006. "Handbook of Economic Forecasting," Handbook of Economic Forecasting, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 1, number 1.
    18. Stock J.H. & Watson M.W., 2002. "Forecasting Using Principal Components From a Large Number of Predictors," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 97, pages 1167-1179, December.
    19. Ing, Ching-Kang, 2003. "Multistep Prediction In Autoregressive Processes," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 19(2), pages 254-279, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Martínez-Martín, Jaime & Rusticelli, Elena, 2021. "Keeping track of global trade in real time," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 224-236.
    2. Audrone Jakaitiene & Stephane Dees, 2012. "Forecasting the World Economy in the Short Term," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(3), pages 331-350, March.
    3. Antonello D’Agostino & Michele Modugno & Chiara Osbat, 2017. "A Global Trade Model for the Euro Area," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 13(4), pages 1-34, December.
    4. Amélie Charles & Olivier Darné, 2022. "Backcasting world trade growth using data reduction methods," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(10), pages 3169-3191, October.
    5. J.-S. Pentecôte & J.-C. Poutineau & F. Rondeau, 2015. "Trade Integration and Business Cycle Synchronization in the EMU: The Negative Effect of New Trade Flows," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 61-79, February.
    6. Golinelli, Roberto & Parigi, Giuseppe, 2014. "Tracking world trade and GDP in real time," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 30(4), pages 847-862.
    7. Stéphanie Guichard & Elena Rusticelli, 2011. "A Dynamic Factor Model for World Trade Growth," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 874, OECD Publishing.
    8. Stephane DEES & Audrone JAKAITIENE, 2008. "Short-term Forecasting Methods of International Trade Variables," EcoMod2008 23800029, EcoMod.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kim, Hyun Hak & Swanson, Norman R., 2018. "Mining big data using parsimonious factor, machine learning, variable selection and shrinkage methods," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 339-354.
    2. Kirstin Hubrich & Guenter Beck & Massimiliano Marcellino, 2000. "Regional Inflation Dynamics within and across Euro Area Countries and a Comparison with the US," Regional and Urban Modeling 283600037, EcoMod.
    3. Clark, Todd E. & West, Kenneth D., 2007. "Approximately normal tests for equal predictive accuracy in nested models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 138(1), pages 291-311, May.
    4. Rua, António, 2017. "A wavelet-based multivariate multiscale approach for forecasting," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 581-590.
    5. Sandra Eickmeier & Christina Ziegler, 2008. "How successful are dynamic factor models at forecasting output and inflation? A meta-analytic approach," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(3), pages 237-265.
    6. Bräuning, Falk & Koopman, Siem Jan, 2014. "Forecasting macroeconomic variables using collapsed dynamic factor analysis," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 572-584.
    7. Anindya Banerjee & Massimiliano Marcellino & Igor Masten, 2008. "Forecasting Macroeconomic Variables Using Diffusion Indexes in Short Samples with Structural Change," Working Papers 334, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University.
    8. Mayr, Johannes, 2010. "Forecasting Macroeconomic Aggregates," Munich Dissertations in Economics 11140, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    9. Karim Barhoumi & Olivier Darné & Laurent Ferrara, 2010. "Are disaggregate data useful for factor analysis in forecasting French GDP?," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(1-2), pages 132-144.
    10. Darracq Pariès, Matthieu & Maurin, Laurent, 2008. "The role of country-specific trade and survey data in forecasting euro area manufacturing production: perspective from large panel factor models," Working Paper Series 894, European Central Bank.
    11. Groen, Jan J.J. & Kapetanios, George, 2016. "Revisiting useful approaches to data-rich macroeconomic forecasting," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 221-239.
    12. Guido Bulligan & Roberto Golinelli & Giuseppe Parigi, 2010. "Forecasting monthly industrial production in real-time: from single equations to factor-based models," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 39(2), pages 303-336, October.
    13. Knut Are Aastveit & Francesco Ravazzolo & Herman K. van Dijk, 2018. "Combined Density Nowcasting in an Uncertain Economic Environment," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(1), pages 131-145, January.
    14. Hendry, David F. & Hubrich, Kirstin, 2006. "Forecasting economic aggregates by disaggregates," Working Paper Series 589, European Central Bank.
    15. Kelly, Bryan & Pruitt, Seth, 2015. "The three-pass regression filter: A new approach to forecasting using many predictors," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 186(2), pages 294-316.
    16. António Rua & Francisco Craveiro Dias, 2008. "Determining the number of factors in approximate factor models with global and group-specific factors," Working Papers w200809, Banco de Portugal, Economics and Research Department.
    17. Duarte, Claudia & Rua, Antonio, 2007. "Forecasting inflation through a bottom-up approach: How bottom is bottom?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 941-953, November.
    18. Luciani, Matteo, 2014. "Forecasting with approximate dynamic factor models: The role of non-pervasive shocks," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 20-29.
    19. Christian Schumacher, 2007. "Forecasting German GDP using alternative factor models based on large datasets," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(4), pages 271-302.
    20. Smeekes, Stephan & Wijler, Etienne, 2018. "Macroeconomic forecasting using penalized regression methods," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 408-430.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    World trade; Factor models; Forecasts; Time series models; C53; C32; E37; F17;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C53 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Forecasting and Prediction Models; Simulation Methods
    • C32 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes; State Space Models
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
    • F17 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Forecasting and Simulation

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:openec:v:20:y:2009:i:3:p:385-402. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.