A Comparison of U.S. Housing Starts Forecasts

Hamid Baghestani (baghesta@msn.com)
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Hamid Baghestani: Department of Economics, American University of Sharjah

Economics Bulletin, 2009, vol. 29, issue 4, 2525-2530

Abstract: This study examines the Federal Reserve and private forecast accuracy of housing starts. We show that the Federal Reserve (private) forecasts are (generally) unbiased and superior to the random walk benchmark. At the shorter horizon, the Federal Reserve and private forecasts embody distinct predictive information, indicating that one can gain a significant improvement in forecast accuracy by combining the two sets of forecasts. At the longer horizon, our findings support the asymmetric information hypothesis that the Federal Reserve forecasts embody useful predictive information beyond that contained in the private forecasts.

Keywords: Greenbook forecasts; Survey of Professional Forecasters, Unbiasedness, Asymmetric information, Forecast combination (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E3 E5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009-10-05
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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