Bus 41202: Analysis of Financial Time Series

Spring 2017, Ruey S. Tsay

Lecture 1: Introduction

Financial time series (FTS) analysis is concerned with theory and

practice of asset valuation over time.

What is the difference, if any, from traditional time series analysis?

Two topics are highly related, but FTS has added uncertainty,
because it must deal with the ever-changing business & economic
environment and the fact that volatility is not directly observed.

Objective of the course

• to access financial data online and to process the embedded in-
formation
• to provide basic knowledge of FTS data such as skewness, heavy
tails, and measure of dependence between asset returns
• to introduce statistical tools & econometric models useful for
analyzing these series.
• to gain experience in analyzing FTS
• to introduce recent developments in financial econometrics and
their applications, e.g., high-frequency finance
• to study methods for assessing market risk, credit risk, and ex-
pected loss. The methods discussed include Value at Risk, ex-
pected shortfall, and tail dependence.

1
 • to analyze high-dimensional asset returns, including co-movement

Examples of financial time series

1. Daily log returns of Apple stock: 2007 to 2016 (10 years). Data
downloaded using quantmod
2. The VIX index
3. CDS spreads: Daily 3-year CDS spreads of JP Morgan from July
20, 2004 to September 19, 2014.
4. Quarterly earnings of Coca-Cola Company: 1983-2009
Seasonal time series useful in
• earning forecasts
• pricing weather related derivatives (e.g. energy)
• modeling intraday behavior of asset returns
5. US monthly interest rates (3m & 6m Treasury bills)
Relations between the two asset returns? Term structure of in-
terest rates
6. Exchange rate between US Dollar vs Euro
Fixed income, hedging, carry trade
7. Size of insurance claims
Values of fire insurance claims (×1000 Krone) that exceeded 500
from 1972 to 1992.
8. High-frequency financial data:
Tick-by-tick data of Caterpillars stock: January 04, 2010.

2
 0.10
0.05
0.00
ln−rtn

−0.05
−0.10
−0.15
−0.20

2008 2010 2012 2014 2016

date

Figure 1: Daily log returns of Apple stock from 2007 to 2016

3
 25
20
15
density

10
5
0

−0.20 −0.15 −0.10 −0.05 0.00 0.05 0.10 0.15

ln−rtn

Figure 2: Empirical density function of daily log returns of Apple stock: 2007 to 2016

4
 CDS of JPM: 3−yr spread
0.020
0.015
spread3y

0.010
0.005
0.000

2006 2008 2010 2012 2014

year

Figure 3: Time plot of daily 3-year CDS spreads of JPM: from July 20, 2004 to September
19, 2014.

5
 VIXCLS [2004−01−02/2014−03−07]
Last 14.11 80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

Jan 02 2004 Jan 03 2007 Jan 04 2010 Jan 02 2013

Figure 4: CBOE Vix index: January 2, 2004 to March 7, 2014.

6
 EPS of Coca Cola: 1983−2009
1.0
0.8
0.6
y

0.4
0.2
0.0

1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010

Time

Figure 5: Quarterly earnings per share of Coca-Cola Company

7
 Dollars per Euro
1.6
1.4
eu
1.2
1.0
0.8

2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010

year

Figure 6: Daily Exchange Rate: Dollars per Euro

8
 ln−rtn: US−EU
0.04
0.02
rtn
0.0
−0.02

2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010

year

Figure 7: Daily log returns of FX (Dollar vs Euro)

9
 useu: ln−rtn
400
300
200
100
0

−0.02 0.0 0.02 0.04

r

Figure 8: Histogram of daily log returns of FX (Dollar vs Euro)

10
 15
10
rate
5
0

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

year

Figure 9: Monthly US interest rates: 3m & 6m TB

11
 1.5
1.00.5
spread
0.0 −0.5
−1.0

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

year

Figure 10: Spread of monthly US interest rates: 3m & 6m TB

12
 Norwegian Fire Insurance Data: 1972−1992
•
400000
200000 300000
claim size

• •
• •
•
100000

• • •
• • •
• • • •
• • •
• • • •• • •
• •• •• •• • • • • •••
• • • •• ••• •• •••
•• •• •• •• •••• •• ••• ••
••• ••
•• ••
•• ••• ••• ••
••
•• •••• ••• •• •• •••• ••• ••• ••• •••
••
•• •••
••
•• ••
•• • • • • • •
0

75 80 85 90
year

Figure 11: Claim sizes of the Norwegian fire insurance from 1972 to 1992, measured in 1000
Krone and exceeded 500.

13
CAT trade data on January 04, 2010.
date hour minute second price size
20100104 9 30 0 57.65 3910
20100104 9 30 0 57.7 400
20100104 9 30 0 57.68 100
20100104 9 30 0 57.69 300
20100104 9 30 1 57.65 462
20100104 9 30 1 57.65 100
20100104 9 30 1 57.65 100
20100104 9 30 1 57.65 100
20100104 9 30 1 57.7 100
20100104 9 30 1 57.7 100
20100104 9 30 1 57.72 500
20100104 9 30 1 57.72 100
20100104 9 30 2 57.73 100
20100104 9 30 3 57.73 300
20100104 9 30 3 57.72 100
20100104 9 30 4 57.72 300
20100104 9 30 5 57.57 100
20100104 9 30 5 57.57 500
20100104 9 30 5 57.56 300
......
20100104 9 30 35 57.77 100
20100104 9 30 36 57.77 100
20100104 9 30 42 57.54 83600
20100104 9 30 42 57.57 100
.....
20100104 9 30 42 57.55 100
20100104 9 30 42 57.55 2400
20100104 9 30 42 57.56 100
20100104 9 30 42 57.55 100
20100104 9 30 42 57.55 100
20100104 9 30 42 57.55 100
20100104 9 30 42 57.54 170
20100104 9 30 42 57.54 200

Outline of the course

• Returns & their characteristics: empirical analysis (summary
statistics)
• Simple linear time series models & their applications
• Univariate volatility models & their implications
14
 • Nonlinearity in level and volatility
• Neural network & non-parametric methods
• High-frequency financial data and market micro-structure
• Continuous-time models and derivative pricing
• Value at Risk, extreme value theory and expected shortfall (also
known as conditional VaR)
• Analysis of multiple asset returns: factor models, dynamic and
cross dependence, cross-section regression

Asset Returns
Let Pt be the price of an asset at time t, and assume no dividend.
One-period simple return: Gross return
Pt
1 + Rt = or Pt = Pt−1(1 + Rt)
Pt−1
Simple return:
Pt Pt − Pt−1
Rt = −1= .
Pt−1 Pt−1
Multiperiod simple return: Gross return
Pt Pt Pt−1 Pt−k+1
1 + Rt(k) = = × × ··· ×
Pt−k Pt−1 Pt−2 Pt−k
= (1 + Rt)(1 + Rt−1) · · · (1 + Rt−k+1).
Pt
The k-period simple net return is Rt(k) = Pt−k − 1.

Example: Table below gives six daily (adjusted) closing prices of

Apple stock in December 2015. The 1-day gross return of holding the
15
stock from 12/23 to 12/24 1 + Rt = 107.45/108.02 ≈ 0.9947 so that
the daily simple return is −0.53%, which is (107.45−108.02)/108.02.

Date 12/23 12/24 12/28 12/29 12/30 12/31

Price($) 108.02 107.45 106.24 108.15 106.74 104.69

Time interval is important! Default is one year.

Annualized (average) return:
 1/k
k−1
Annualized[Rt(k)] =  (1 + Rt−j ) − 1.
Y

j=0

An approximation:
1 k−1
Annualized[Rt(k)] ≈ Rt−j .
X

k j=0
Continuously compounding: Illustration of the power of compound-
ing (int. rate 10% per annum)
Type #(payment) Int. Net
Annual 1 0.1 $1.10000
Semi-Annual 2 0.05 $1.10250
Quarterly 4 0.025 $1.10381
Monthly 12 0.0083 $1.10471
0.1
Weekly 52 52 $1.10506
0.1
Daily 365 365 $1.10516
Continuously ∞ $1.10517

A = C exp[r × n]
where r is the interest rate per annum, C is the initial capital, n is
the number of years, and exp is the exponential function.
16
Present value:
C = A exp[−r × n]
Continuously compounded (or log) return
Pt
rt = ln(1 + Rt) = ln = pt − pt−1,
Pt−1
where pt = ln(Pt).
Multiperiod log return:
rt(k) = ln[1 + Rt(k)]
= ln[(1 + Rt)(1 + Rt−1) · · · (1 + Rt−k+1)]
= ln(1 + Rt) + ln(1 + Rt−1) + · · · + ln(1 + Rt−k+1)
= rt + rt−1 + · · · + rt−k+1.

Example. Consider again the Apple stock price.

1. What is the log return from 12/23 to 12/24:
A: rt = ln(107.45) − ln(108.02) = −0.529%.
2. What is the log return from day 12/23 to 12/31?
A: rt(6) = ln(104.69) − ln(108.02) = −3.13%.

Portfolio return: N assets

N
Rp,t = wiRit
X

i=1

Example: An investor holds stocks of IBM, Microsoft and Citi-

Group. Assume that her capital allocation is 30%, 30% and 40%.
Use the monthly simple returns in Table 1.2 of the text. What is the
mean simple return of her stock portfolio?
17
Answer: E(Rt) = 0.3 × 1.35 + 0.3 × 2.62 + 0.4 × 1.17 = 1.66.
Dividend payment:
Pt + Dt
Rt = − 1, rt = ln(Pt + Dt) − ln(Pt−1).
Pt−1
Excess return: (adjusting for risk)
Zt = Rt − R0t, zt = rt − r0t
where r0t denotes the log return of a reference asset (e.g. risk-free
interest rate).
Relationship:
rt = ln(1 + Rt), Rt = ert − 1.
If the returns are in percentage, then
Rt
rt = 100 × ln(1 + ), Rt = [exp(rt/100) − 1] × 100.
100
Temporal aggregation of the returns produces
1 + Rt(k) = (1 + Rt)(1 + Rt−1) · · · (1 + Rt−k+1),
rt(k) = rt + rt−1 + · · · + rt−k+1.
These two relations are important in practice, e.g. obtain annual
returns from monthly returns.

Example. If the monthly log returns of an asset are 4.46%, −7.34%

and 10.77%, then what is the corresponding quarterly log return?
Answer: 4.46 − 7.34 + 10.77 = 7.89%.
Example: If the monthly simple returns of an asset are 4.46%,
−7.34% and 10.77%, then what is the corresponding quarterly simple
return?
Answer: R = (1 + 0.0446)(1 − 0.0734)(1 + 0.1077) − 1 = 1.0721 − 1
= 0.0721 = 7.21%
18
Distributional properties of returns
Key: What is the distribution of
{rit; i = 1, · · · , N ; t = 1, · · · , T }?
Some theoretical properties:
Moments of a random variable X with density f (x): `-th moment
∞
m0`
Z
` `
= E(X ) = −∞
x f (x)dx
First moment: mean or expectation of X.
`-th central moment
`
Z ∞
m` = E[(X − µx) ] = −∞
(x − µx)`f (x)dx,
2nd central moment: Variance of X.
standard deviation: square-root of variance
Skewness (symmetry) and kurtosis (fat-tails)
3 4
   
(X − µx)  (X − µx) 
S(x) = E  3
, K(x) = E  4
.
σx σx
K(x) − 3: Excess kurtosis.

Q1: Why study the mean and variance of returns?

They are concerned with long-term return and risk, respectively.
Q2: Why is symmetry important?
Symmetry has important implications in holding short or long finan-
cial positions and in risk management.
Q3: Why is kurtosis important?
Related to volatility forecasting, efficiency in estimation and tests
High kurtosis implies heavy (or long) tails in distribution.
Estimation:
Data:{x1, · · · , xT }

19
 • sample mean:
1 T
µ̂x = xt ,
X

T t=1

• sample variance:
1 X T
σ̂x2 = (xt − µ̂x)2,
T − 1 t=1
• sample skewness:
1 T
3
Ŝ(x) = (x − µ̂ ) ,
X
t x
(T − 1)σ̂x3 t=1
• sample kurtosis:
1 T
4
K̂(x) = (x − µ̂ ) .
X
t x
(T − 1)σ̂x4 t=1
Under normality assumption,
6 24
Ŝ(x) ∼ N (0, ), K̂(x) − 3 ∼ N (0, ).
T T
Some simple tests for normality (for large T ).
1. Test for symmetry:
Ŝ(x)
S∗ = r ∼ N (0, 1)
6/T
if normality holds.
Decision rule: Reject Ho of a symmetric distribution if |S ∗| >
Zα/2 or p-value is less than α.
2. Test for tail thickness:
K̂(x) − 3
K∗ = r ∼ N (0, 1)
24/T
20
 if normality holds.
Decision rule: Reject Ho of normal tails if |K ∗| > Zα/2 or
p-value is less than α.
3. A joint test (Jarque-Bera test):
JB = (K ∗)2 + (S ∗)2 ∼ χ22
if normality holds, where χ22 denotes a chi-squared distribution
with 2 degrees of freedom.
Decision rule: Reject Ho of normality if JB > χ22(α) or p-
value is less than α.
Empirical properties of returns
Data sources: Use packages, e.g. quantmod
• Course web:
http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/ruey.tsay/teaching/bs41202/sp2017/
• CRSP: Center for Research in Security Prices (Wharton WRDS)
https://wrds-web.wharton.upenn.edu/wrds/
• Various web sites, e.g. Federal Reserve Bank at St. Louis
https://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/
• Data sets of the textbook:
http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/ruey.tsay/teaching/fts3/
Empirical dist of asset returns tends to be skewed to the left with
heavy tails and has a higher peak than normal dist. See Table 1.2 of
the text.

Demonstration of Data Analysis

21
 0.06

0.06
0.05

0.05
0.04

0.04
density

density
0.03

0.03
0.02

0.02
0.01

0.01
0.0

0.0

−40 −20 0 20 40 −40 −20 0 20 40

simple return log return

Figure 12: Comparison of empirical IBM return densities (solid) with Normal densities
(dashed)

22
R demonstration: Use monthly IBM stock returns from 1967 to
2008.
**** Task: (a) Set the working directory
(b) Load the library ‘‘fBasics’’.
(c) Compute summary (or descriptive) statistics
(d) Perform test for mean return being zero.
(e) Perform normality test using the Jaque-Bera method.
(f) Perform skewness and kurtosis tests.

> setwd("C:/Users/rst/teaching/bs41202/sp2017") <== set working directory

> library(fBasics) <== Load the library ‘‘fBasics’’.

> da=read.table("m-ibm-6815.txt",header=T)
> head(da)
PERMNO date PRC ASKHI BIDLO RET vwretd ewretd sprtrn
1 12490 19680131 594.50 623.0 588.75 -0.051834 -0.036330 0.023902 -0.043848
2 12490 19680229 580.00 599.5 571.00 -0.022204 -0.033624 -0.056118 -0.031223
3 12490 19680329 612.50 612.5 562.00 0.056034 0.005116 -0.011218 0.009400
4 12490 19680430 677.50 677.5 630.00 0.106122 0.094148 0.143031 0.081929
5 12490 19680531 357.00 696.0 329.50 0.055793 0.027041 0.091309 0.011169
6 12490 19680628 353.75 375.0 346.50 -0.009104 0.011527 0.016225 0.009120
> dim(da)
[1] 576 9
> ibm=da$RET % Simple IBM return
> lnIBM <- log(ibm+1) % compute log return
> ts.plot(ibm,main="Monthly IBM simple returns: 1968-2015") % Time plot
> mean(ibm)
[1] 0.008255663
> var(ibm)
[1] 0.004909968
> skewness(ibm)
[1] 0.2687105
attr(,"method")
[1] "moment"
> kurtosis(ibm)
[1] 2.058484
attr(,"method")
[1] "excess"
> basicStats(ibm)
ibm
nobs 576.000000
NAs 0.000000
Minimum -0.261905
Maximum 0.353799
1. Quartile -0.034392

23
3. Quartile 0.048252
Mean 0.008256
Median 0.005600
Sum 4.755262
SE Mean 0.002920
LCL Mean 0.002521
UCL Mean 0.013990
Variance 0.004910
Stdev 0.070071
Skewness 0.268710
Kurtosis 2.058484
> basicStats(lnIBM) % log return
lnIBM
nobs 576.000000
NAs 0.000000
Minimum -0.303683
Maximum 0.302915
1. Quartile -0.034997
3. Quartile 0.047124
Mean 0.005813
Median 0.005585
Sum 3.348008
SE Mean 0.002898
LCL Mean 0.000120
UCL Mean 0.011505
Variance 0.004839
Stdev 0.069560
Skewness -0.137286
Kurtosis 1.910438
> t.test(lnIBM) %% Test mean=0 vs mean .not. zero

One Sample t-test

data: lnIBM
t = 2.0055, df = 575, p-value = 0.04538
alternative hypothesis: true mean is not equal to 0
95 percent confidence interval:
0.0001199015 0.0115051252
sample estimates:
mean of x
0.005812513

> normalTest(lnIBM,method=’jb’)
Title: Jarque - Bera Normalality Test

Test Results:

24
 STATISTIC:
X-squared: 90.988
P VALUE:
Asymptotic p Value: < 2.2e-16

> s3=skewness(lnIBM); T <- length(lnIBM)

> tst <- s3/sqrt(6/T) % test skewness
> tst
[1] -1.345125
> pv <- 2*pnorm(tst)
> pv
[1] 0.1785849
> k4 <- kurtosis(lnIBM)
> tst <- k4/sqrt(24/T) % test excess kurtosis
> tst
[1] 9.359197
>q() % quit R.

Normal and lognormal dists

Y is lognormal if X = ln(Y ) is normal.
If X ∼ N (µ, σ 2), then Y = exp(X) is lognormal with
Mean and variance:
σ2
E(Y ) = exp(µ + ), V (Y ) = exp(2µ + σ 2)[exp(σ 2) − 1].
2
Conversely, if Y is lognormal with mean µy and variance σy2, then
X = ln(Y ) is normal with mean and variance
 

σy2 
 
µy
 
 
E(X) = ln , V (X) = ln 1 + 2  .
  
v 
2 µy
u 
u σy 
t
1+ µ2y


Application: If the log return of an asset is normally distributed

with mean 0.0119 and standard deviation 0.0663, then what is the
mean and standard deviation of its simple return?
Answer: Solve this problem in two steps.
25
Step 1: Based on the prior results, the mean and variance of Yt =
exp(rt) are
0.06632 
 

E(Y ) = exp 0.0119 +


 = 1.014
2
V (Y ) = exp(2 × 0.0119 + 0.06632)[exp(0.06632) − 1] = 0.0045
Step 2: Simple return is Rt = exp(rt) − 1 = Yt − 1. Therefore,
E(R) = E(Y ) − 1 = 0.014
r
V (R) = V (Y ) = 0.0045, standard dev = V (R) = 0.067
Remark: See the monthly IBM stock returns in Table 1.2.

Processes considered
• return series (e.g., ch. 1, 2, 5)
• volatility processes (e.g., ch. 3, 4, 10, 12)
• continuous-time processes (ch. 6)
• extreme events (ch. 7)
• multivariate series (ch. 8, 9, 10)

Likelihood function (for self study)

Finally, it pays to study the likelihood function of returns {r1, · · · , rT }
discussed in Chapter 1.
Basic concept:
Joint dist = Conditional dist × Marginal dist, i.e.
f (x, y) = f (x|y)f (y)

26
For two consecutive returns r1 and r2, we have
f (r2, r1) = f (r2|r1)f (r1).
For three returns r1, r2 and r3, by repeated application,
f (r3, r2, r1) = f (r3|r2, r1)f (r2, r1)
= f (r3|r2, r1)f (r2|r1)f (r1).
In general, we have
f (rT , rT −1, · · · , r2, r1)
= f (rT |rT −1, · · · , r1)f (rT −1, · · · , r1)
= f (rT |rT −1, · · · , r1)f (rT −1|rt−2, · · · , r1)f (rT −2, · · · , r1)
= ...
T


= f (rt|rt−1, · · · , r1) f (r1),

Y

t=2

where Tt=2 denotes product.

Q

If rt|rt−1, · · · , r1 is normal with mean µt and variance σt2, then like-

lihood function becomes
2
 
T 1 −(rt − µt) 
f (rT , rT −1, · · · , r1) = √ exp   f (r1 ).
Y

2πσt 2σt2
t=2

For simplicity, if f (r1) is ignored, then the likelihood function be-

comes
2
 
T 1 −(rt − µ )
t 
f (rT , rT −1, · · · , r1) = √ exp  .
Y

2πσ 2σ 2
t=2 t t
This is the conditional likelihood function of the returns under nor-
mality.
Other dists, e.g. Student-t, can be used to handle heavy tails.

Model specification
27
 • µt: discussed in Chapter 2
• σt2: Chapters 3 and 4.

Quantifying dependence: Consider two variables X and Y .

• Pearson’s correlation coefficient:
Cov(X, Y )
ρ= .
std(X)std(Y )

• Kendall’s tau: Let (X̃, Ỹ ) be a random copy of (X, Y ).

ρτ = P [(X − X̃)(Y − Ỹ ) > 0] − P [(X − X̃)(Y − Ỹ ) < 0]
= E[sign[(X − X̃)(Y − Ỹ )]].
This measure quantifies the probability of concordant over dis-
cordant. Here concordant means (X − X̃)(Y − Ỹ ) > 0. For
spherical distributions, e.g., normal, ρτ = π2 sin−1(ρ).
• Spearman’s rho: rank correlation. Let Fx(x) and Fy (y) be the
cumulative distribution function of X and Y .
ρs = ρ(Fx(X), Fy (Y )).
That is, the correlation coefficient of probability-transformed
variables. It is just the correlation coefficient of the ranks of
the data.
Q: Why do we consider different measures of dependence?
• Correlation coefficient encounters problems when the distribu-
tions are not normal (spherical, in general). This is particularly
relevant in risk management.

28
 • Correlation coefficient focuses no linear dependence and is not
robust to outliers.
• The actual range of the correlation coefficient can be much smaller
than [−1, 1].

R Demonstration
> head(da)
PERMNO date PRC ASKHI BIDLO RET vwretd ewretd sprtrn
1 12490 19680131 594.50 623.0 588.75 -0.051834 -0.036330 0.023902 -0.043848
2 12490 19680229 580.00 599.5 571.00 -0.022204 -0.033624 -0.056118 -0.031223
3 12490 19680329 612.50 612.5 562.00 0.056034 0.005116 -0.011218 0.009400
4 12490 19680430 677.50 677.5 630.00 0.106122 0.094148 0.143031 0.081929
5 12490 19680531 357.00 696.0 329.50 0.055793 0.027041 0.091309 0.011169
6 12490 19680628 353.75 375.0 346.50 -0.009104 0.011527 0.016225 0.009120
> ibm <- da$RET
> sp <- da$sprtrn
> plot(sp,ibm)
> cor(sp,ibm)
[1] 0.5785249
> cor(sp,ibm,method="kendall")
[1] 0.4172056
> cor(sp,ibm,method="spearman")
[1] 0.58267
> cor(rank(ibm),rank(sp))
[1] 0.58267

> z=rnorm(1000) %% Genreate 1000 random variates from N(0,1)

> x=exp(z)
> y=exp(20*z)
> cor(x,y)
[1] 0.3187030
> cor(x,y,method=’kendall’)
[1] 1
> cor(x,y,method=’spearman’)
[1] 1

Takeaway
1. Understand the summary statistics of asset returns
2. Understand various definitions of returns & their relationships
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 3. Learn basic characteristics of FTS
4. Learn the basic R functions. (See Rcommands-lec1.txt on the
course web.)

R commands used to produce plots in Lecture 1.

> x=read.table("d-aapl0413.txt",header=T) <== Load Apple stock returns
> dim(x) <== check the size of the data file
[1] 2517 3
> x[1,] <== show the first row of the data
Permno date rtn
1 14593 20040102 -0.004212
> y=ts(x[,3],frequency=252,start=c(2004,1)) <== Create a time-series object in R.
> plot(y,type=’l’,xlab=’year’,ylab=’rtn’)
> title(main=’Daily returns of Apple stock: 2004 to 2013’)

> par(mfcol=c(2,1)) <== To put two plots on a single page

> y=y*100 <== percentage returns
> hist(y,nclass=50)
> title(main=’Percentage returns’)
> d1=density(y)
> plot(d1$x,d1$y,xlab=’returns’,ylab=’den’,type=’l’)

> x=read.table("m-tb3ms.txt",header=T) <== Load 3m-TB rates

> dim(x)
[1] 914 4

> y=read.table("m-tb6ms.txt",header=T) <== Load 6m-TB rates

> dim(y)
[1] 615 4
> 914-615
[1] 299
> x[300,] <== Check date of the 3m-TB
year mon day value
300 1958 12 1 2.77
> y[1,] <== Check date of the 1st observation of 6m-TB
year mon day value
1 1958 12 1 3.01

> int=cbind(x[300:914,4],y[,4]) <== Line up the two TB rates

> tdx=(c(1:615)+11)/12+1959
> par(mfcol=c(1,1))
> max(int)

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[1] 16.3
> plot(tdx,int[,1],xlab=’year’,ylab=’rate’,type=’l’,ylim=c(0,16.5))
> lines(tdx,int[,2],lty=2) <== Plot the 6m-TB rate on the same frame.

> plot(tdx,int[,2]-int[,1],xlab=’year’,ylab=’spread’,type=’l’)
> abline(h=c(0)) <== Draw a horizontal like to ‘‘zero’’.

> x=read.table("q-ko-earns8309.txt",header=T) <== Load KO data

> dim(x)
[1] 107 3
> x[1,]
pends anntime value
1 19830331 19830426 0.0375
> tdx=c(1:107)/12+1983
> plot(tdx,x[,3],xlab=’year’,ylab=’earnings’,type=’l’)
> title(main=’EPS of Coca Cola: 1983-2009’)
> points(tdx,x[,3])
>
> y=read.table("d-exuseu.txt",header=T) <== Load USEU exchange rates
> dim(y)
[1] 3567 4
> y[1,]
year mon day value
1 1999 1 4 1.1812
> tdx=c(1:3567)/252+1999
> plot(tdx,y[,4],xlab=’year’,ylab=’eu’,type=’l’)
> title(main=’Dollars per Euro’)

> r=diff(log(y[,4])) <=== Compute log returns

> plot(tdx[2:3567],r,xlab=’year’,ylab=’rtn’,type=’l’)
> title(main=’ln-rtn: US-EU’)

> hist(r,nclass=50)
> title(main=’useu: ln-rtn’)

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 Linear Time Series (TS) Models

Financial TS: collection of a financial measurement over time

Example: log return rt

Data: {r1, r2, · · · , rT } (T data points)

Purpose: What is the information contained in {rt}?

Basic concepts
• Stationarity:
– Strict: distributions are time-invariant
– Weak: first 2 moments are time-invariant
What does weak stationarity mean in practice?
Past: time plot of {rt} varies around a fixed level within a
finite range!
Future: the first 2 moments of future rt are the same as those of
the data so that meaningful inferences can be made.
• Mean (or expectation) of returns:
µ = E(rt)

• Variance (variability) of returns:

Var(rt) = E[(rt − µ)2]

• Sample mean and sample variance are used to estimate the mean
and variance of returns.
1 XT 1 X T
r̄ = rt & Var(rt) = (rt − r̄)2
T t=1 T − 1 t=1
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• Test Ho : µ = 0 vs Ha : µ 6= 0. Compute
r̄ r̄
t= =r
std(r̄) Var(rt)/T
Compare t ratio with N (0, 1) dist.
Decision rule: Reject Ho of zero mean if |t| > Zα/2 or p-value
is less than α.
• Lag-k autocovariance:
γk = Cov(rt, rt−k ) = E[(rt − µ)(rt−k − µ)].

• Serial (or auto-) correlations:

cov(rt, rt−`)
ρ` =
var(rt)
Note: ρ0 = 1 and ρk = ρ−k for k 6= 0. Why?
Existence of serial correlations implies that the return is pre-
dictable, indicating market inefficiency.
• Sample autocorrelation function (ACF)
PT −`
t=1 (rt − r̄)(rt+` − r̄)
ρb` = PT 2
,
(r
t=1 t − r̄)
where r̄ is the sample mean & T is the sample size.
• Test zero serial correlations (market efficiency)
– Individual test: for example,
Ho : ρ1 = 0 vs Ha : ρ1 6= 0
ρ̂1 √
t= r = T ρ̂1
1/T
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 Asym. N (0, 1).
Decision rule: Reject Ho if |t| > Zα/2 or p-value less than
α.
– Joint test (Ljung-Box statistics):
Ho : ρ1 = · · · = ρm = 0 vs Ha : ρi 6= 0
m ρ̂2`
Q(m) = T (T + 2)
X

`=1 T − `

Asym. chi-squared dist with m degrees of freedom.

Decision rule: Reject Ho if Q(m) > χ2m(α) or p-value is
less than α.
• Sources of serial correlations in financial TS
– Nonsynchronous trading (ch. 5)
– Bid-ask bounce (ch. 5)
– Risk premium, etc. (ch. 3)
Thus, significant sample ACF does not necessarily imply market
inefficiency.
Example: Monthly returns of IBM stock from 1926 to 1997.
• Rt: Q(5) = 5.4(0.37) and Q(10) = 14.1(0.17)
• rt: Q(5) = 5.8(0.33) and Q(10) = 13.7(0.19)
Remark: What is p-value? How to use it?
Implication: Monthly IBM stock returns do not have significant serial
correlations.
Example: Monthly returns of CRSP value-weighted index from
1926 to 1997.

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 • Rt: Q(5) = 27.8 and Q(10) = 36.0
• rt: Q(5) = 26.9 and Q(10) = 32.7
All highly significant. Implication: there exist significant serial corre-
lations in the value-weighted index returns. (Nonsynchronous trading
might explain the existence of the serial correlations, among other
reasons.) Similar result is also found in equal-weighted index returns.

R demonstration: IBM monthly simple returns from 1968 to 2015

> da=read.table("m-ibm-6815.txt",header=T)
> ibm=da$RET
> acf(ibm) %% Plot not shown
> m1 <- acf(ibm)
> names(m1)
[1] "acf" "type" "n.used" "lag" "series" "snames"
> m1$acf
[,1]
[1,] 1.0000000000 % lag 0
[2,] -0.0068713539 % lag 1
[3,] -0.0002212888
....
[28,] 0.0159729906

> m2 <- pacf(ibm) % Partial ACF

> names(m2)
[1] "acf" "type" "n.used" "lag" "series" "snames"
> m1$acf
[,1]
[1,] 1.0000000000
[2,] -0.0068713539
[3,] -0.0002212888
....
[28,] 0.0159729906

> Box.test(ibm,lag=10) % Box-Pierce Q(m) test

Box-Pierce test
data: ibm
X-squared = 7.1714, df = 10, p-value = 0.7092

> Box.test(ibm,lag=10,type=’Ljung’) % Ljung-Box Q(m) test

Box-Ljung test
data: ibm

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X-squared = 7.2759, df = 10, p-value = 0.6992

Back-shift (lag) operator

A useful notation in TS analysis.
• Definition: Brt = rt−1 or Lrt = rt−1
• B 2rt = B(Brt) = Brt−1 = rt−2.
B (or L) means time shift! Brt is the value of the series at time
t − 1.
Suppose that the daily log returns are
Day 1 2 3 4
rt 0.017 −0.005 −0.014 0.021
Answer the following questions:
• r2 =
• Br3 =
• B 2r5 =
Question: What is B2?

What are the important statistics in practice?

Conditional quantities, not unconditional

A proper perspective: at a time point t

• Available data: {r1, r2, · · · , rt−1} ≡ Ft−1
• The return is decomposed into two parts as
rt = predictable part + not predictable part
= function of elements of Ft−1 + at
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 In other words, given information Ft−1
rt = µt + at
= E(rt|Ft−1) + σtt
– µt: conditional mean of rt
– at: shock or innovation at time t
– t: an iid sequence with mean zero and variance 1
– σt: conditional standard deviation (commonly called volatil-
ity in finance)
Traditional TS modeling is concerned with µt:
Model for µt: mean equation
Volatility modeling concerns σt.
Model for σt2: volatility equation

Univariate TS analysis serves two purposes

• a model for µt
• understanding models for σt2: properties, forecasting, etc.

Linear time series: rt is linear if

• the predictable part is a linear function of Ft−1
• {at} are independent and have the same dist. (iid)
Mathematically, it means rt can be written as
∞
rt = µ + ψiat−i,
X

i=0

where µ is a constant, ψ0 = 1 and {at} is an iid sequence with mean

zero and well-defined distribution.
37
In the economic literature, at is the shock (or innovation) at time t
and {ψi} are the impulse responses of rt.

White noise: iid sequence (with finite variance), which is the build-
ing block of linear TS models.
White noise is not predictable, but has zero mean and finite variance.

Univariate linear time series models

1. autoregressive (AR) models
2. moving-average (MA) models
3. mixed ARMA models
4. seasonal models
5. regression models with time series errors
6. fractionally differenced models (long-memory)

Example Quarterly growth rate of U.S. real gross national product

(GNP), seasonally adjusted, from the second quarter of 1947 to the
first quarter of 1991.
An AR(3) model for the data is
rt = 0.005 + 0.35rt−1 + 0.18rt−2 − 0.14rt−3 + at, σ̂a = 0.01,
where {at} denotes a white noise with variance σa2. Given rn, rn−1 & rn−2,
we can predict rn+1 as
r̂n+1 = 0.005 + 0.35rn + 0.18rn−1 − 0.14rn−2.
Other implications of the model?

38
In this course, we use statistical methods to find models that fit
the data well for making inference, e.g. prediction. On the other
hand, there exists economic theory that leads to time-series models
for economic variables. For instance, consider the real business-cycle
theory in macroeconomics. Under some simplifying assumptions, one
can show that ln(Yt), where Yt is the output (GDP), follows an AR(2)
model. See Advanced Macroeconomics by David Romer (2006, 3rd,
pp. 190).

Example: Monthly simple return of Center for Research in Security

Prices (CRSP) equal-weighted index
Rt = 0.013 + at + 0.178at−1 − 0.13at−3 + 0.135at−9, σ̂a = 0.073
Checking: Q(10) = 11.4(0.122) for the residual series at.
Implications of the model?
Statistical significance vs economic significance.

In this course, we shall discuss some reasons for the observed se-
rial dependence in index returns. See, for example, Chapter 5 on
nonsynchronous trading.

Important properties of a model

• Stationarity condition
• Basic properties: mean, variance, serial dependence
• Empirical model building: specification, estimation, & checking
• Forecasting

39