Forecasting through the rear-view mirror: data revisions and bond return predictability

Real-time macroeconomic data reflect the information available to market participants, whereas final data—containing revisions and released with a delay—overstate the information set available to them. We document that the in-sample and out-of-sample Treasury return predictability is significantly diminished when real-time as opposed to revised macroeconomic data are used. In fact, much of the predictive information in macroeconomic time series is due to the data revision and publication lag components.