What is this thing called confidence? A comparative analysis of consumer confidence indices in eight major countries

Roberto Golinelli and Giuseppe Parigi

No 484, Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) from Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area

Abstract: The paper examines the evolution of consumer confidence indices in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States of America since the 1970s, by modelling them in a multivariate framework of common macroeconomic variables for each country. Results suggest that: (a) the main economic determinants of consumer confidence cannot be summarized only on the basis of some macroeconomic variables; (b) consumer confidence indices have some ability to forecast economic activity, provided that both their coincident nature is taken into account and that a number of data-coherent parameter restrictions are imposed. A number of analyses (both insample and out-of-sample) are devoted to assessing the robustness of previous findings.

Keywords: consumer confidence determinants; GDP indicator; in-sample and out-of-sample forecasting ability (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C32 C51 C52 E32 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2003-09
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_484_03

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