Since the advent of standard national accounts data over 60 years ago, economists have traditionally relied on monthly or quarterly data supplied by central statistical agencies for macroeconomic modelling and forecasting. However, technological advances of the past several years have resulted...

We assess the usefulness of a large set of electronic payments data comprising debit and credit card transactions, as well as cheques that clear through the banking system, as potential indicators of current GDP growth. These variables capture a broad range of spending activity and are available...

This paper uses payments system data to study the impact on personal consumption expenditure, and therefore on economic activity, of occasional extreme events. The usual quarterly data supplied by central statistical agencies are of little use to policy makers for monitoring effects of...

Many official economic indicators are released with a time lag, released infrequently and often require revision. In this Commentary, I discuss new sources of electronically recorded data that are both timely and reflect the real-time intentions of millions (or billions) of agents. Specifically,...