We propose a new set of formal backtests for VaR-forecasts that significantly improve upon existing backtesting procedures. Our new test of unconditional coverage can be used for both one-sided and two-sided testing, which leads to a significantly increased power. Second, we stress the...

We investigate if portfolios can be improved if the classical Markowitz mean–variance portfolio theory is combined with recently proposed change point tests for dependence measures. Taking into account that the dependence structure of financial assets typically cannot be assumed to be constant...

A CUSUM type test for constant correlation that goes beyond a previously suggested correlation constancy test by considering Spearman’s rho in arbitrary dimensions is proposed. Since the new test does not require the existence of any moments, the applicability on usually heavy-tailed financial...

The paper modifies previously suggested GMM approaches to spatial autoregression in stock returns. Our model incorporates global dependencies, dependencies inside industrial branches and local dependencies. As can be seen from Euro Stoxx 50 returns, this combination of spatial modeling and...

We present a test to determine whether variances of time series are constant over time. The test statistic is a suitably standardized maximum of cumulative first and second moments. We apply the test to time series of various assets and find that the test performs well in applications. Moreover,...

We propose a specification test for a wide range of parametric models for the conditional distribution function of an outcome variable given a vector of covariates. The test is based on the Cramer--von Mises distance between an unrestricted estimate of the joint distribution function of the data...