We study estimation and inference of the expected shortfall for time series with infinite variance. Both the smoothed and nonsmoothed estimators are investigated. The rate of convergence is determined by the tail thickness parameter, and the limiting distribution is in the stable class with parameters depending on the tail thickness parameter of the time series and on the dependence structure, which makes inference complicated. A subsampling procedure is proposed to carry out statistical inference. We also analyze a nonparametric estimator of the conditional expected shortfall. A Monte Carlo experiment is conducted to evaluate the finite sample performance of the proposed inference procedure, and an empirical application to emerging market exchange rates (from October 1997 to October 2008) is conducted to highlight the proposed study.

We propose estimators of the memory parameter of a time series that are robust to a wide variety of random level shift processes, deterministic level shifts, and deterministic time trends. The estimators are simple trimmed versions of the popular log-periodogram regression estimator that employ certain sample-size-dependent and, in some cases, data-dependent trimmings that discard low-frequency components. We also show that a previously developed trimmed local Whittle estimator is robust to the same forms of data contamination. Regardless of whether the underlying long- or short-memory process is contaminated by level shifts or deterministic trends, the estimators are consistent and asymptotically normal with the same limiting variance as their standard untrimmed counterparts. Simulations show that the trimmed estimators perform their intended purpose quite well, substantially decreasing both finite-sample bias and root mean-squared error in the presence of these contaminating components. Furthermore, we assess the trade-offs involved with their use when such components are not present but the underlying process exhibits strong short-memory dynamics or is contaminated by noise. To balance the potential finite-sample biases involved in estimating the memory parameter, we recommend a particular adaptive version of the trimmed log-periodogram estimator that performs well in a wide variety of circumstances. We apply the estimators to stock market volatility data to find that various time series typically thought to be long-memory processes actually appear to be short- or very weak long-memory processes contaminated by level shifts or deterministic trends.

This paper questions whether it is possible to derive consistency and asymptotic normality of the Gaussian quasi-maximum likelihood estimator (QMLE) for possibly the simplest multivariate GARCH model, namely, the multivariate ARCH(1) model of the Baba, Engle, Kraft, and Kroner form, under weak moment conditions similar to the univariate case. In contrast to the univariate specification, we show that the expectation of the log-likelihood function is unbounded, away from the true parameter value, if (and only if) the observable has unbounded second moment. Despite this nonstandard feature, consistency of the Gaussian QMLE is still warranted. The same moment condition proves to be necessary and sufficient for the stationarity of the score when evaluated at the true parameter value. This explains why high moment conditions, typically bounded sixth moment and above, have been used hitherto in the literature to establish the asymptotic normality of the QMLE in the multivariate framework.

We analyze estimators and tests for a general class of vector error correction models that allows for asymmetric and nonlinear error correction. For a given number of cointegration relationships, general hypothesis testing is considered, where testing for linearity is of particular interest. Under the null of linearity, parameters of nonlinear components vanish, leading to a nonstandard testing problem. We apply so-called sup-tests to resolve this issue, which requires development of new(uniform) functional central limit theory and results for convergence of stochastic integrals. We provide a full asymptotic theory for estimators and test statistics. The derived asymptotic results prove to be nonstandard compared to results found elsewhere in the literature due to the impact of the estimated cointegration relations. This complicates implementation of tests motivating the introduction of bootstrap versions that are simple to compute. A simulation study shows that the finite-sample properties of the bootstrapped tests are satisfactory with good size and power properties for reasonable sample sizes.

This paper presents computationally simple estimators for the index coefficients in a binary choice model with a binary endogenous regressor without relying on distributional assumptions or on large support conditions and yields root-n consistent and asymptotically normal estimators. We develop a multistep method for estimating the parameters in a triangular, linear index, threshold-crossing model with two equations. Such an econometric model might be used in testing for moral hazard while allowing for asymmetric information in insurance markets. In outlining this new estimation method two contributions are made. The first one is proposing a novel “matching” estimator for the coefficient on the binary endogenous variable in the outcome equation. Second, in order to establish the asymptotic properties of the proposed estimators for the coefficients of the exogenous regressors in the outcome equation, the results of Powell, Stock, and Stoker (1989, Econometrica 75, 1403–1430) are extended to cover the case where the average derivative estimation requires a first-step semiparametric procedure.

We analyze fast procedures for conducting Monte Carlo experiments involving bootstrap estimators, providing formal results establishing the properties of these methods under general conditions.

Nielsen (Working paper, University of Oxford, 2009) shows that vector autoregression is inconsistent when there are common explosive roots with geometric multiplicity greater than unity. This paper discusses that result, provides a coexplosive system extension and an illustrative example that helps to explain the finding, gives a consistent instrumental variable procedure, and reports some simulations. Some exact limit distribution theory is derived and a useful new reverse martingale central limit theorem is proved.

This paper considers testing for moment condition instability for a wide variety of models that arise in econometric applications. We propose a nonparametric test based on smoothing the moment conditions over time. The resulting test takes the form of a U-statistic and has a limiting normal distribution. The proposed test statistic is not affected by changes in the distribution of the data, so long as certain simple regularity conditions hold. We examine the performance of the test through a small Monte Carlo experiment.

Goodness-of-fit tests based on parametric empirical processes have nonstandard limiting distributions when the null hypothesis is composite — that is, when parameters of the null model are estimated. Several analytic solutions to this problem have been suggested, including the calculation of adjusted critical values for these nonstandard distributions and the transformation of the empirical process such that statistics based on the transformed process are asymptotically distribution-free. The approximation methods proposed by Durbin (1985, Journal of Applied Probability 22(1), 99–122) can be applied to conduct inference for tests based on supremum-norm statistics. The resulting tests have quite accurate size, a fact that has gone unrecognized in the econometrics literature. Some justification for this accuracy lies in the similar features that Durbin’s approximation methods share with the theory of extrema for Gaussian random fields and for Gauss-Markov processes. These adjustment techniques are also related to the transformation methodology proposed by Khmaladze (1981, Theory of Probability and Its Applications26(2), 240–257) through the score function of the parametric model. Simulation experiments suggest that in small samples, Durbin-style adjustments result in tests that have higher power than tests based on transformed processes, and in some cases they have higher power than parametric bootstrap procedures.

This article deals with detection of a nonconstant long memory parameter in time series. The null hypothesis presumes stationary or nonstationary time series with a constant long memory parameter, typically an I (d) series with d > −.5 . The alternative corresponds to an increase in persistence and includes in particular an abrupt or gradual change from I (d1) to I (d2), −.5 < d1 < d2. We discuss several test statistics based on the ratio of forward and backward sample variances of the partial sums. The consistency of the tests is proved under a very general setting. We also study the behavior of these test statistics for some models with a changing memory parameter. A simulation study shows that our testing procedures have good finite sample properties and turn out to be more powerful than the KPSS-based tests (see Kwiatkowski, Phillips, Schmidt and Shin, 1992) considered in some previous works.

In this paper we investigate the impact of persistent (nonstationary or near nonstationary) cycles on the asymptotic and finite-sample properties of standard unit root tests. Results are presented for the augmented Dickey–Fuller (ADF) normalized bias and t-ratio-based tests (Dickey and Fuller, 1979, Journal of the American Statistical Association 745, 427–431; Said and Dickey, 1984; Biometrika 71, 599–607). the variance ratio unit root test of Breitung (2002, Journal of Econometrics 108, 343–363), and the M class of unit-root tests introduced by Stock (1999, in Engle and White (eds.), A Festschrift in Honour of Clive W.J. Granger) and Perron and Ng (1996, Review of Economic Studies 63, 435–463). We show that although the ADF statistics remain asymptotically pivotal (provided the test regression is properly augmented) in the presence of persistent cycles, this is not the case for the other statistics considered and show numerically that the size properties of the tests based on these statistics are too unreliable to be used in practice. We also show that the t-ratios associated with lags of the dependent variable of order greater than two in the ADF regression are asymptotically normally distributed. This is an important result as it implies that extant sequential methods (see Hall, 1994, Journal of Business & Economic Statistics 17, 461–470; Ng and Perron, 1995, Journal of the American Statistical Association 90, 268–281) used to determine the order of augmentation in the ADF regression remain valid in the presence of persistent cycles.

Testing for the presence of a broken linear trend when the nature of the persistence in the data is unknown is not a trivial problem, because the test needs to be both asymptotically correctly sized and consistent, regardless of the order of integration of the data. In a recent paper, Sayginsoy and Vogelsang (2011, Econometric Theory 27, 992–1025) (SV) show that tests based on fixed-b asymptotics provide a useful solution to this problem in the case where the shocks may be either weakly dependent or display strong dependence within the near-unit-root class. In this paper we analyze the performance of these tests when the shocks may be fractionally integrated, an alternative model paradigm that allows for either weak or strong dependence in the shocks. We demonstrate that the fixed-b trend break statistics converge to well-defined limit distributions under both the null and local alternatives in this case (and retain consistency against fixed alternatives), but that these distributions depend on the fractional integration parameter δ. As a result, it is only when δ is either zero or one that the SV critical values yield correctly sized tests. Consequently, we propose a procedure that employs δ-adaptive critical values to remove the size distortions in the SV test. In addition, use of δ-adaptive critical values also allows us to consider a simplification of the SV test that is (asymptotically) correctly sized across δ but can also provide a significant increase in power over the standard SV test when δ = 1.

This paper generalizes the results for the Bridge estimator of Huang, Horowitz, and Ma (2008) to linear random and fixed effects panel data models which are allowed to grow in both dimensions. In particular, we show that the Bridge estimator isoracle efficient. It can correctly distinguish between relevant and irrelevant variables and the asymptotic distribution of the estimators of the coefficients of the relevant variables is the same as if only these had been included in the model, i.e. as if an oracle had revealed the true model prior to estimation.

In the case of more explanatory variables than observations we prove that the Marginal Bridge estimator can asymptotically correctly distinguish between relevant and irrelevant explanatory variables if the error terms are Gaussian. Furthermore, a partial orthogonality condition of the same type as in Huang et al. (2008) is needed to restrict the dependence between relevant and irrelevant variables.

Financial practices often need to estimate an integrated volatility matrix of a large number of assets using noisy high-frequency data. Many existing estimators of a volatility matrix of small dimensions become inconsistent when the size of the matrix is close to or larger than the sample size. This paper introduces a new type of large volatility matrix estimator based on nonsynchronized high-frequency data, allowing for the presence of microstructure noise. When both the number of assets and the sample size go to infinity, we show that our new estimator is consistent and achieves a fast convergence rate, where the rate is optimal with respect to the sample size. A simulation study is conducted to check the finite sample performance of the proposed estimator.

Simple methods are developed for deriving Edgeworth, saddlepoint, and related expansions for the estimators of multivariate and nonlinear models. Illustrations are provided. Simulations are reported indicating the methods work well compared to standard asymptotic and bootstrapped approaches.

In this paper we extend fixed-b asymptotic theory to the nonparametric Phillips–Perron (PP) unit root tests. We show that the fixed-b limits depend on nuisance parameters in a complicated way. These nonpivotal limits provide an alternative theoretical explanation for the well-known finite-sample problems of the PP tests. We also show that the fixed-b limits depend on whether deterministic trends are removed using one-step or two-step detrending approaches. This is in contrast to the asymptotic equivalence of the one- and two-step approaches under a consistency approximation for the long-run variance estimator. Based on these results we introduce modified PP tests that allow for asymptotically pivotal fixed-b inference. The theoretical analysis is cast in the framework of near-integrated processes, which allows us to study the asymptotic behavior both under the unit root null hypothesis and for local alternatives. The performance of the original and modified PP tests is compared by means of local asymptotic power and a small finite-sample simulation study.