A general multivariate threshold GARCH model with dynamic conditional correlations

We propose a new multivariate GARCH model with Dynamic Conditional Correlations that extends previous models by admitting multivariate thresholds in conditional volatilitiesand correlations. The model estimation is feasible in large dimensions and the positive definiteness of the conditional covariance matrix is easily ensured by the structure of the model. Thresholds in conditional volatilities and correlations are estimated from the data, together with all other model parameters. We study the performance of our model in three distinct applications to US stock and bond market data. Even if the conditional volatility functions of stock returns exhibit pronounced GARCH and threshold features, their conditional correlation dynamics depends on a very simple threshold structure with no local GARCH features. We obtain a similar result for the conditional correlations between government and corporate bond returns. On the contrary, we find both threshold and GARCH structures in the conditional correlations between stock and government bond returns. In all applications, ourmodel improves significantly the in-sample and out-of-sample forecasting power for future conditional correlations with respect to other relevant multivariate GARCH models.