The ability of futures markets to predict subsequent spot prices has been a controversial topic for a number of years. Empirical evidence to date is mixed; for any given market, some studies find evidence of efficiency, others of inefficiency. In part, these apparently conflicting findings reflect...

Monthly data on the $US/ECU exchange rate are analysed in light of the random walk hypothesis. A battery of tests, including procedures that are robust to conditional heteroscedasticity, are applied against linear alternatives to departures from the random walk. These tests are all based on the...

Much research has been devoted to assessing the evidence for linear trend in a time series. We discuss the statistical implications of some recent developments, with specific application to 24 time series of relative primary commodities prices. Copyright 2003 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

The Grilli and Yang commodity price index is one of the most widely used commodity price series in the applied economics literature. This note provides some practical advice on updating this data series by listing the base period index values, identifying relevant data sources, and describing a...