Related papers: Benchmarking Econometric and Machine Learning Meth…

We apply artificial neural networks (ANNs) to nowcast quarterly GDP growth for the U.S. economy. Using the monthly FRED-MD database, we compare the nowcasting performance of five different ANN architectures: the multilayer perceptron (MLP),…

Macroeconomic nowcasting sits at the intersection of traditional econometrics, data-rich information systems, and AI applications in business, economics, and policy. Machine learning (ML) methods are increasingly used to nowcast quarterly…

Alternative data sets are widely used for macroeconomic nowcasting together with machine learning--based tools. The latter are often applied without a complete picture of their theoretical nowcasting properties. Against this background,…

The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the increasing need of policymakers for timely estimates of macroeconomic variables. A prior UNCTAD research paper examined the suitability of long short-term memory artificial neural networks (LSTM)…

Macroeconomic data are crucial for monitoring countries' performance and driving policy. However, traditional data acquisition processes are slow, subject to delays, and performed at a low frequency. We address this 'ragged-edge' problem…

In the dynamic landscape of continuous change, Machine Learning (ML) "nowcasting" models offer a distinct advantage for informed decision-making in both public and private sectors. This study introduces ML-based GDP growth projection models…

We develop a novel Bayesian framework for dynamic modeling of mixed frequency data to nowcast quarterly U.S. GDP growth. The introduced framework utilizes foundational Bayesian theory and treats data sampled at different frequencies as…

Artificial neural networks (ANNs) have been the catalyst to numerous advances in a variety of fields and disciplines in recent years. Their impact on economics, however, has been comparatively muted. One type of ANN, the long short-term…

This paper investigates the benefits of internet search data in the form of Google Trends for nowcasting real U.S. GDP growth in real time through the lens of mixed frequency Bayesian Structural Time Series (BSTS) models. We augment and…

In this study, we propose a novel approach of nowcasting and forecasting the macroeconomic status of a country using deep learning techniques. We focus particularly on the US economy but the methodology can be applied also to other…

Recent results in the literature indicate that artificial neural networks (ANNs) can outperform the dynamic factor model (DFM) in terms of the accuracy of GDP nowcasts. Compared to the DFM, the performance advantage of these highly…

We introduce a novel application of Support Vector Machines (SVM), an important Machine Learning algorithm, to determine the beginning and end of recessions in real time. Nowcasting, "forecasting" a condition about the present time because…

We introduce a new method of nowcasting using regression on path signatures. Path signatures capture the geometric properties of sequential data. Because signatures embed observations in continuous time, they naturally handle mixed…

Real-time economic information is essential for policy-making but difficult to obtain. We introduce a granular nowcasting method for macro- and industry-level GDP using a network approach and data on real-time monthly inter-industry…

We investigate the predictive power of different machine learning algorithms to nowcast Madagascar's gross domestic product (GDP). We trained popular regression models, including linear regularized regression (Ridge, Lasso, Elastic-net),…

Timely assessment of current conditions is essential especially for small, open economies such as Singapore, where external shocks transmit rapidly to domestic activity. We develop a real-time nowcasting framework for quarterly GDP growth…

We investigate the effectiveness of different machine learning methodologies in predicting economic cycles. We identify the deep learning methodology of Bi-LSTM with Autoencoder as the most accurate model to forecast the beginning and end…

This paper surveys the recent advances in machine learning method for economic forecasting. The survey covers the following topics: nowcasting, textual data, panel and tensor data, high-dimensional Granger causality tests, time series…

This paper develops Bayesian econometric methods for posterior inference in non-parametric mixed frequency VARs using additive regression trees. We argue that regression tree models are ideally suited for macroeconomic nowcasting in the…

The quest for accurate economic forecasting has traditionally been dominated by econometric models, which most of the times rely on the assumptions of linear relationships and stationarity in of the data. However, the complex and often…