This thesis consists of two parts: the first examines the Expectations Hypothesis of the Term Structure for New Zealand, and the latter examines the predictive power of the term spread on future economic activity in New Zealand. For both parts, I divide the sample period into two sub-sample periods – the pre-OCR period and the OCR period. Using Mankiw & Miron’s (1986) approach for testing the expectations hypothesis, the findings in this paper suggest that the theory is consistent with New Zealand data during the OCR period. I attribute the success of the theory to the introduction of the Official Cash Rate system in March 1999. The change from targeting the settlement cash balance to targeting an interest rate variable has substantially improved the predictability of short-term interest rates. In regards to the predictive power of the spread, the findings in this paper support the conventional view that the spread is positively related to future economic activity. Using Hamilton & Kim’s (2002) approach, I decomposed the term spread into an expectation component and a term premium in an attempt to find out whether these two variables have distinctly separate effect on future economic activity. My findings are in contrast to that reported by Hamilton & Kim. In particular, I find that the term premium in some cases is significant and negatively related to future economic activity in New Zealand. I attribute the negative relationship to lower long-term interest rates and a fallen term premium in New Zealand.

U.S. money market securities have been found to exhibit behavior consistent with preferred habitat for liquidity around year-ends (Griffiths and Winters (1997, 2004)). In particular, repurchase agreement and commercial paper yields tend to increase when the security begins to mature across the end of the year, and return to normal levels after the year-end obligations have been paid but before the calendar year-end. The competing hypothesis, window dressing by financial intermediaries around disclosure dates, requires that the increase in yields be sustained until after the turn of the year. This study is aimed at finding whether the behavior of international money markets around year-ends and quarter-ends is more consistent with preferred habitat for liquidity or window dressing. This is done by analyzing changes in LIBOR for different currencies around quarter-ends. A second part of the study considers the effect of preferred habitat on the term structure of short-term interest rates. The expectations hypothesis of the term structure posits that future expected interest rates are implied by the current term structure. Empirical research suggests that the expectations hypothesis often does not hold, especially at the short end of the term structure. Preferred habitat for liquidity in short-term rates may be one of the reasons for the failure of expectations. The same LIBOR data set is used to test for the expectations in the presence of preferred habitat for liquidity. The empirical results of this study suggest that preferred habitat for liquidity in the short-term rates around quarter-ends and year-ends is not responsible for the failure of the expectations hypothesis in the data.

Este trabalho teve como finalidade testar a validade da teoria sobre flutuações na estrutura a termo da taxa de juros – a Hipótese das Expectativas – que estabelece em linhas gerais, que a taxa de juros de longo prazo é formado como uma média das taxas de juros de curto prazo esperadas para o futuro mais um prêmio de risco invariente no tempo; desde a adoção do sistema de Metas para Inflação, com base na estrutura elaborada por Campbell e Shiller (1987, 1991). Apesar de problemas potencias, este exercício possui relevância na medida em que as análises em sua maioria corroboram com os fundamentos pelo que se conclui de forma favorável a validade do modelo. As Evidencias empíricas sugerem que a adoção da estrutura de Metas para Inflação tem apresentado um efeito amortecedor de choques na taxa de juros sobre a estrutura a termo. Com base nos resultados obtidos fica evidente que existe algum grau de antecipação das ações de política monetária pelos participantes de mercado e que, portanto, mudanças na meta para a taxa de juros de curto prazo podem ser previstas e são incorporadas as taxas de juros de mercado, ao menos parcialmente. / The aim of this study was to test the expectation theory of term structure of interest rate to the Brazilian economy under the model developed by Campbell and Shiller (19987, 1991). The Expectation Hypothesis (EH) of term structure of interest rate define that the long-term rate is determined by market’s expectation for the shortterm rate plus a constant risk premium. I found that the forecasting decline with the increasing of maturity spectrum but, a causality test granger provide ambiguous results in some test. Under the Inflation Targeting structure the result show that the agents foresee, at least partially, the monetary policy’s decisions. In general way the results support EH theory for Brazilian data.

Este trabalho teve como finalidade testar a validade da teoria sobre flutuações na estrutura a termo da taxa de juros – a Hipótese das Expectativas – que estabelece em linhas gerais, que a taxa de juros de longo prazo é formado como uma média das taxas de juros de curto prazo esperadas para o futuro mais um prêmio de risco invariente no tempo; desde a adoção do sistema de Metas para Inflação, com base na estrutura elaborada por Campbell e Shiller (1987, 1991). Apesar de problemas potencias, este exercício possui relevância na medida em que as análises em sua maioria corroboram com os fundamentos pelo que se conclui de forma favorável a validade do modelo. As Evidencias empíricas sugerem que a adoção da estrutura de Metas para Inflação tem apresentado um efeito amortecedor de choques na taxa de juros sobre a estrutura a termo. Com base nos resultados obtidos fica evidente que existe algum grau de antecipação das ações de política monetária pelos participantes de mercado e que, portanto, mudanças na meta para a taxa de juros de curto prazo podem ser previstas e são incorporadas as taxas de juros de mercado, ao menos parcialmente. / The aim of this study was to test the expectation theory of term structure of interest rate to the Brazilian economy under the model developed by Campbell and Shiller (19987, 1991). The Expectation Hypothesis (EH) of term structure of interest rate define that the long-term rate is determined by market’s expectation for the shortterm rate plus a constant risk premium. I found that the forecasting decline with the increasing of maturity spectrum but, a causality test granger provide ambiguous results in some test. Under the Inflation Targeting structure the result show that the agents foresee, at least partially, the monetary policy’s decisions. In general way the results support EH theory for Brazilian data.

Este trabalho teve como finalidade testar a validade da teoria sobre flutuações na estrutura a termo da taxa de juros – a Hipótese das Expectativas – que estabelece em linhas gerais, que a taxa de juros de longo prazo é formado como uma média das taxas de juros de curto prazo esperadas para o futuro mais um prêmio de risco invariente no tempo; desde a adoção do sistema de Metas para Inflação, com base na estrutura elaborada por Campbell e Shiller (1987, 1991). Apesar de problemas potencias, este exercício possui relevância na medida em que as análises em sua maioria corroboram com os fundamentos pelo que se conclui de forma favorável a validade do modelo. As Evidencias empíricas sugerem que a adoção da estrutura de Metas para Inflação tem apresentado um efeito amortecedor de choques na taxa de juros sobre a estrutura a termo. Com base nos resultados obtidos fica evidente que existe algum grau de antecipação das ações de política monetária pelos participantes de mercado e que, portanto, mudanças na meta para a taxa de juros de curto prazo podem ser previstas e são incorporadas as taxas de juros de mercado, ao menos parcialmente. / The aim of this study was to test the expectation theory of term structure of interest rate to the Brazilian economy under the model developed by Campbell and Shiller (19987, 1991). The Expectation Hypothesis (EH) of term structure of interest rate define that the long-term rate is determined by market’s expectation for the shortterm rate plus a constant risk premium. I found that the forecasting decline with the increasing of maturity spectrum but, a causality test granger provide ambiguous results in some test. Under the Inflation Targeting structure the result show that the agents foresee, at least partially, the monetary policy’s decisions. In general way the results support EH theory for Brazilian data.

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A set of forecast survey data is analyzed in this paper for properties consistent with the Rational Expectations Hypothesis. Standard statistical tests for "rational expectations" are employed utilizing consensus forecasts generated by an interest rate newsletter. Four selected variables (Fed Funds rate, M1 rate of growth, rate of change in CPI, and real GNP growth rate) are analyzed over multiple time horizons. Results tend to reject "rational expectations" for most variables and time horizons. Forecasts are more likely to meet "rationality" criteria the shorter the forecast horizon, with the notable exception of forecasts of real GNP growth.

This doctoral thesis is a collection of four papers on the analysis of the term structure of interest rates with a focus at the intersection of macroeconomics and finance. "Risk in Macroeconomic Fundamentals and Bond Return Predictability" documents that factors related to risks underlying the macroeconomy such as expectations, uncertainty and downside (upside) macroeconomic risks are able to explain variation in bond risk premia. The information provided is found to be, to a large extent, unrelated to that contained in forward rates and current macroeconomic conditions. "Out-of-sample bond excess returns predictability" provides evidence that macroeconomic variables, risks in macroeconomic outcomes as well as the combination of these different sources of information are able to generate statistical as well as economic bond excess returns predictability in an out-of-sample setting. Results suggest that this finding is not driven by revisions in macroeconomic data. The term spread (yield curve slope) is largely used as an indicator of future economic activity. "Re-examining the predictive power of the yield curve with quantile regression" provides new evidence on the predictive ability of the term spread by studying the whole conditional distribution of GDP growth. "Modeling and forecasting the yield curve by extended Nelson-Siegel class of models: a quantile regression approach" deals with yield curve prediction. More flexible Nelson-Siegel models are found to provide better fitting to the data, even when penalizing for additional model complexity. For the forecasting exercise, quantile-based models are found to overcome all competitors. / <p>Diss. Stockholm :  Stockholm School of Economics, 2014. Introduction together with 4 papers.</p>

Diss. (sammanfattning) Stockholm : Handelshögskolan, 2008 Sammanfattning jämte 3 uppsatser

The three chapters of this thesis investigate different aspects of the economics of health and wellbeing. The first chapter tests the rationality of life satisfaction forecasts. Contrary to the rational expectations hypothesis it shows that young people and those who are satisfied strongly overpredict future life satisfaction while the elderly and the unsatisfied strongly underpredict it. The second chapter is about how wealth shocks affect the health of retirees in the US. Results indicate strongly positive effects on physical health, mental health and mortality. The third chapter analyzes the effects of graduating in an unfavorable economic environment on graduates' subsequent income, health insurance and mortality. It finds that recession graduates have significantly lower incomes and worse health insurance coverage. And during the outbreak of the HIV/AIDS epidemic AIDS mortality has been significantly higher among these unlucky cohorts. / Los tres capítulos de esta tesis doctoral investigan aspectos de la economía del bienestar y de la salud. El primer capítulo pone a prueba la racionalidad de las predicciones de las personas respecto a la satisfacción global que experimentarán con su vida en el futuro. Se muestra que, en contra de la hipótesis de expectativas racionales, las predicciones de los jóvenes y de quien está satisfecho con su vida son más altas que los niveles de satisfacción realizados posteriormente, mientras las predicciones de las personas mayores y de quien no está satisfecho con su vida son más bajas que los niveles posteriormente experimentados. El segundo capítulo investiga cómo los cambios exógenos de riqueza afectan la salud de una muestra de jubilados en los EEUU. Los resultados indican efectos positivos de la riqueza sobre la salud, tanto física como mental, y un efecto negativo sobre la mortalidad. El tercer capítulo analiza los efectos de graduarse de la universidad en un entorno económico recesivo sobre la salud, la riqueza, y la mortalidad. Graduarse en tiempos de recesión tiene efectos negativos persistentes sobre el salario, la cobertura médica, y - durante la epidemia del SIDA - tambien sobre la mortalidad.