Fernando Perez de Gracia

Do oil price shocks matter? Evidence for some European countries

This paper analyzes the oil price-macroeconomy relationship by means of analyzing the impact of oil prices on inflation and industrial production indexes for many European countries using quarterly data for the period 1960-1999. First, we test for cointegration allowing for structural breaks among the variables. Second, and in order to account for the possible non-linear relationships, we use different transformation of oil price data. The main results suggest that oil prices have permanent effects on inflation and short run but asymmetric effects on production growth rates. Furthermore, significant differences are found among the responses of the countries to these shocks.

Seasonal Fractional Integration in the Spanish Tourism Quarterly Time Series

Seasonal fractional models are shown in this article to be alternative credible ways of modeling the seasonal component in the Spanish tourism time series. The authors use a testing procedure, due to Robinson, that permits them to consider unit and fractional orders of integration in raw time series. This method is applied to the number of foreigners and the number of foreign guest nights in Spain, the results showing that the orders of integration in both series are higher than 0 but smaller than 1, implying seasonal long memory behavior.

Real convergence in some Central and Eastern European countries

This article examines the real convergence hypothesis in some Central and East European countries (both towards the German and the US economies) by means of using time series techniques during the period 1950 to 2003. No evidence is found of real convergence for the whole period. However, when one allows for structural breaks, evidence is found of a catch-up process during the 1990s to 2003 period for Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary towards Germany and only for Poland towards the US economy.

Does Media Consumption Make Us Happy? Evidence for Spain

This article concerns the study of the impact of media consumption on happiness in Spain using data from the fourth wave of the European Social Survey, distinguishing between watching TV, listening to the radio, reading newspapers, and using the Internet. A negative effect of TV watching was found on individual happiness, mainly among women; those with higher incomes; and those with paying jobs—that is, among those with a higher opportunity cost of time. However, this negative effect on happiness does not appear for radio listening, newspaper reading, or Internet usage.

Oil prices and economic activity: evidence for G-7 economies based on a wavelet approach

ABSTRACT This study examines the relationship between oil prices and economic activity in the G-7 economies during the period 1960M1–2014M07 using a wavelet approach. The results show significant differences in the relationship between these two variables depending on the frequencies. Furthermore, we find that oil price shocks affect economic activity at low frequencies (long run) in all G-7 countries, while the effect at high frequencies (short run) is limited to a few countries.

Stochastic volatility in the Spanish stock market: a long memory model with a structural break

In this paper, we examine the stochastic volatility behaviour in the Spanish stock market returns over the time period 2 January 2001 – 12 May 2006. We use a long memory model that takes into account the existence of an endogenous structural break. When no breaks are taken into account the results show that the orders of integration of the absolute and squared return values (which are used as proxies of volatility) are higher than 0 but smaller than 0.5, implying that the stochastic volatility is stationary but long memory. If a break is considered, long memory is also found in the two sub-samples, with higher orders of integration before the break, which takes place at around 2003 for the IBEX, and at 2004 for the less liquid assets IGBM.

Exchange rate behavior and exchange rate puzzles: why the 18th century might help

This article explores the behavior of exchange rates in Spain during the XVIII century. We posit that exchange rates were the result of both government intervention over nominal values of currencies and the estimate that the market of bills of exchange- gave to the value of the currency. We analyze the exchange rates quoted in London on three Spanish cities between 1699 and 1826. After a brief overview of the functioning of the Spanish monetary system and of exchange rate determination, we assess the extent to which the exchange rate responded to market fundamentals by testing some theoretical models of exchange rate determination. The results suggest that purchasing power parity held during the XVIII century, with the exchange rate tracking quite closely the behavior of inflation differentials. Deviations from PPP appeared at the end of the century, due mostly to changes in the real exchange rate caused by the bilateral trade balance between Spain and Great Britain and, maybe, to productivity differentials.

Persistence, mean reversion and non-linearities in the US housing prices over 1830–2013

ABSTRACT The objective of this study is to provide a direct estimate of the degree of persistence of measures of nominal and real house prices for the US economy, covering the longest possible annual sample of data, namely 1830–2013. The estimation of the degree of persistence accommodates for non-linear (deterministic) trends using Chebyshev polynomials in time. In general, the results show a high degree of persistence in the series along with a component of non-linear behaviour. In general, if we assume uncorrelated errors, non-linearities are observed in both nominal and real prices, but this hypothesis is rejected in favour of linear models for the log-transformation of the data. However, if autocorrelated errors are permitted, non-linearities are observed in all cases, and mean reversion is found in the case of logged prices, though given the wide confidence intervals, the unit root null hypothesis cannot be rejected in these cases.

Impact of state-dependent oil price on US stock returns using local projections

ABSTRACT In this paper, we investigate the impact of oil prices on both aggregate and industry US real stock returns over the period 1973–2017. The empirical analysis contributes to the related literature introducing a state-dependent oil price (high and low) and the local projections approach. Our main finding is that, depending on the nature of the shock and industry, the negative effects of oil price shocks become exacerbated -and the positive effects get moderated- if oil prices are already high.

Are mergers and acquisitions in the petroleum industry affected by oil prices

ABSTRACT This paper contributes to the literature on crude oil price behavior and examines how this affects mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in the petroleum industry in the US. The paper analyzes the relationship of these two series by studying its dynamic in the time–frequency domain. The novelty of this study’s approach lies in the application of wavelet tools for its resolution. Monthly data are used in this study, covering the period January 1980–June 2012. It was observed that there was a shift to higher frequencies of the wavelet coherency during the mid-1990s and the late 2000s. The results also indicate that during the mid-1990s and the late-2000s, an increase in M&A took place that was led by the increase in West Texas Intermediate crude oil prices.