Reliable data analysis is one of the hardest tasks in sciences and social sciences. Often misleading and sometimes puzzling results arise when the analysis is done without regard for the special features of the data. In this exposition, I will focus on designing new statistical tools to deal with some prominent questions in Finance and Economics. In particular, I will talk about the following. (1) How to characterize the randomness of variables, motivated by a problem in the pricing of financial options. (2) Uncovering the relation between interest rates on different maturities, now and in the future; the "term structure of interest rates". (3) Modelling the unconventional nonlinear long-memory dynamics that arise from a general-equilibrium economic model, and their implications for exchange rates, stock market indexes, and all macroeconomic variables; with recommendations for trading in financial markets, but also for the design of macroeconomic stabilization policies by governments.
The aim of the paper is to compare reactions of two stock markets, the German and the French, to releases of macroeconomic fundamentals emanating from Germany and the U.S. We examine the reaction of intraday returns and volatility of the CAC40 and the DAX indices to macroeconomic surprises. We find that both American and German macroeconomic releases cause an immediate response in returns and volatility of the German and the French stock market sampled at a five-minute frequency. The reaction to the American macroeconomic surprises is stronger than to the German ones.
The paper refines Lenk’s concept of improving the performance of the computed harmonic mean estimator (HME) in three directions. First, the adjusted HME is derived from an exact analytical identity. Second, Lenk’s assumption concerning the appropriate subset A of the parameter space is significantly weakened. Third, it is shown that, under certain restrictions imposed on A, a fundamental identity underlying the HME also holds for improper prior densities, which substantially extends applicability of the adjusted HME.
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