The Svensson generalization of the popular Nelson-Siegel term structure model is widely used by practitioners and central banks. Unfortunately, like the original Nelson-Siegel specification, this generalization, in its dynamic form, does not enforce arbitrage-free consistency over time. Indeed,...

We derive the class of arbitrage-free affine dynamic term structure models that approximate the widely-used Nelson-Siegel yield-curve specification. Our theoretical analysis relates this new class of models to the canonical representation of the three-factor arbitrage-free affine model. Our...

From a macroeconomic perspective, the short-term interest rate is a policy instrument under the direct control of the central bank. From a finance perspective, long rates are risk-adjusted averages of expected future short rates. Thus, as illustrated by much recent research, a joint...

In the first half of this century, special attention was given to two features of the business cycle: (1) the comovement of many individual economic series and (2) the different behavior of the economy during expansions and contractions. Both of these attributes were ignored in many subsequent...

We estimate a model that summarizes the yield curve using latent factors (specifically, level, slope, and curvature) and also includes observable macroeconomic variables (specifically, real activity, inflation, and the monetary policy instrument). Our goal is to provide a characterization of the...

Policy rules that are consistent with inflation targeting are examined in a small macroeconomic model of the US economy. We compare the properties and outcomes of explicit instrument rules' as well as targeting rules.' The latter, which imply implicit instrument rules, may be closer to actual...

Using a small empirical model of inflation, output, and money estimated on U.S. data, we compare the relative performance of monetary targeting and inflation targeting. The results show that monetary targeting would be quite inefficient, with both higher inflation and output variability. This is...

The modern view of monetary policy stresses its role in shaping the entire yield curve of interest rates in order to achieve various macroeconomic objectives. A crucial element of this process involves guiding financial market expectations of future central bank actions. Recently, a few central...

The Diebold-Mariano (DM) test was intended for comparing forecasts; it has been, and remains, useful in that regard. The DM test was not intended for comparing models. Unfortunately, however, much of the large subsequent literature uses DM-type tests for comparing models, in (pseudo-)...

We provide a new and superior measure of U.S. GDP, obtained by applying optimal signal-extraction techniques to the (noisy) expenditure-side and income-side estimates. Its properties - particularly as regards serial correlation - differ markedly from those of the standard expenditure-side...