Constructing Optimal Density Forecasts from Point Forecast Combinations

Luiz Lima () and Wagner Gaglianone

No 5, Série Textos para Discussão (Working Papers) from Programa de Pós-Graduação em Economia - PPGE, Universidade Federal da Paraíba

Abstract: Decision makers often observe point forecasts of the same variable computed, for instance, by commercial banks, IMF, World Bank, but the econometric models used by such institutions are unknown. This paper shows how to use the information available at point forecasts to compute optimal density forecasts. Our idea builds upon the combination of point forecasts under general loss functions and unknonwn forecast error distributions. We use real-time data to forecast the density of future in‡ation in the U.S. and our results indicate that the proposed method materially improves the real-time accuracy of density forecasts vis-à-vis the ones obtained from the (unknown) individual. econometric models.

Keywords: forecast combination; quantile regression; density forecast (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C13 C14 C51 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ecm and nep-for
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (34)

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http://www.ccsa.ufpb.br/ppge/arquivos/ensaios/QC5f.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: CONSTRUCTING OPTIMAL DENSITY FORECASTS FROM POINT FORECAST COMBINATIONS (2014)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ppg:ppgewp:5

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