We construct sentiment indices for 20 countries from 1980 to 2019. Relying on computational text analysis, we capture specific language like 'fear', 'risk', 'hedging', 'opinion', and, 'crisis', as well as 'positive' and 'negative' sentiments, in news articles from the Financial Times. We assess...

We describe the evolution of forecasts in the run-up to recessions. The GDP forecasts cover 63 countries for the years 1992 to 2014. The main finding is that, while forecasters are generally aware that recession years will be different from other years, they miss the magnitude of the recession...

This study seeks to construct a basic reinforcement learning-based AI-macroeconomic simulator. We use a deep RL (DRL) approach (DDPG) in an RBC macroeconomic model. We set up two learning scenarios, one of which is deterministic without the technological shock and the other is stochastic. The...

The COVID-19 crisis has had a tremendous economic impact for all countries. Yet, assessing the full impact of the crisis has been frequently hampered by the delayed publication of official GDP statistics in several emerging market and developing economies. This paper outlines a machine-learning...

This paper analyzes the inflation forecast errors over the period 2021Q1-2022Q3 using forecasts of core and headline inflation from the International Monetary Fund World Economic Outlook for a large group of advanced and emerging market economies. The findings reveal evidence of forecast bias...

Many small middle-income countries (SMICs) in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) have experienced a moderation in growth in recent years. Although factor accumulation, most notably capital deepening, was crucial to the success of many SMICs historically, this growth model appears to have run its course....

The form of bounded rationality characterizing the representative agent is key in the choice of the optimal monetary policy regime. While inflation targeting prevails for myopia that distorts agents' inflation expectations, price level targeting emerges as the optimal policy under myopia...

Against the backdrop of an ongoing review of the inflation-targeting framework, this paper examines the real-time inflation forecasts of the Bank of Canada with the aim of identifying potential areas for improvement. Not surprisingly, the results show that errors in forecasting non-core...

The widespread availability of internet search data is a new source of high-frequency information that can potentially improve the precision of macroeconomic forecasting, especially in areas with data constraints. This paper investigates whether travel-related online search queries enhance...

This paper estimates an inflation function and forecasts one-year ahead inflation for Japan. It finds that (i) markup relationships, excess money and the output gap are particularly relevant long-run determinants for an equilibrium correction model (EqCM) of inflation; (ii) with intercept...