The distribution of model averaging estimators and an impossibility result regarding its estimation

The finite-sample as well as the asymptotic distribution of Leung and Barron's (2006) model averaging estimator are derived in the context of a linear regression model. An impossibility result regarding the estimation of the finite-sample distribution of the model averaging estimator is obtained.Comment: Published at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/074921706000000987 in the IMS Lecture Notes Monograph Series (http://www.imstat.org/publications/lecnotes.htm) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

On the Order of Magnitude of Sums of Negative Powers of Integrated Processes

The asymptotic behavior of expressions of the form $\sum_{t=1}^{n}f(r_{n}x_{t})$ where $x_{t}$ is an integrated process, $r_{n}$ is a sequence of norming constants, and $f$ is a measurable function has been the subject of a number of articles in recent years. We mention Borodin and Ibragimov (1995), Park and Phillips (1999), de Jong (2004), Jeganathan (2004), P\"{o}tscher (2004), de Jong and Whang (2005), Berkes and Horvath (2006), and Christopeit (2009) which study weak convergence results for such expressions under various conditions on $x_{t}$ and the function $f$. Of course, these results also provide information on the order of magnitude of $\sum_{t=1}^{n}f(r_{n}x_{t})$. However, to the best of our knowledge no result is available for the case where $f$ is non-integrable with respect to Lebesgue-measure in a neighborhood of a given point, say $x=0$. In this paper we are interested in bounds on the order of magnitude of $\sum_{t=1}^{n}|x_{t}| ^{-\alpha}$ when $\alpha \geq 1$, a case where the implied function $f$ is not integrable in any neighborhood of zero. More generally, we shall also obtain bounds on the order of magnitude for $\sum_{t=1}^{n}v_{t}|x_{t}| ^{-\alpha}$ where $v_{t}$ are random variables satisfying certain conditions

Lower Risk Bounds and Properties of Confidence Sets For Ill-Posed Estimation Problems with Applications to Spectral Density and Persistence Estimation, Unit Roots,and Estimation of Long Memory Parameters

Important estimation problems in econometrics like estimation the value of a spectral density at frequency zero, which appears in the econometrics literature in the guises of heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent variance estimation and long run variance estimation, are shown to be "ill-posed" estimation problems. A prototypical result obtained in the paper is that the minimax risk for estimation the value of the spectral density at frequency zero is infinite regardless of sample size, and that confidence sets are close to being univormative. In this result the maximum risk is over commonly used specifications for the set of feasible data generating processes. The consequences for inference on unit roots and cointegrating are discussed. Similar results for persistence estimation and estimation of the long memory parameter are given. All these results are obtained as special cases of a more general theory developed for abstract estimation problems, which readily also allows for the treatment of other ill-posed estimation problems such as, e. g. nonparametric regression of density estimation.

Nonlinear Functions and Convergence to Brownian Motion: Beyond the Continuous Mapping Theorem

Weak convergence results for sample averages of nonlinear functions of (discrete-time) stochastic processes satisfying a functional central limit theorem (e.g., integrated processes) are given. These results substantially extend recent work by Park and Phillips (1999) and de Jong (2001), in that a much wider class of functions is covered. For example, some of the results hold for the class of all locally integrable functions, thus avoiding any of the various regularity conditions imposed on the functions in Park and Phillips (1999) or de Jong (2001).

On the Power of Invariant Tests for Hypotheses on a Covariance Matrix

The behavior of the power function of autocorrelation tests such as the Durbin-Watson test in time series regressions or the Cliff-Ord test in spatial regression models has been intensively studied in the literature. When the correlation becomes strong, Kr\"amer (1985) (for the Durbin-Watson test) and Kr\"amer (2005) (for the Cliff-Ord test) have shown that the power can be very low, in fact can converge to zero, under certain circumstances. Motivated by these results, Martellosio (2010) set out to build a general theory that would explain these findings. Unfortunately, Martellosio (2010) does not achieve this goal, as a substantial portion of his results and proofs suffer from serious flaws. The present paper now builds a theory as envisioned in Martellosio (2010) in a fairly general framework, covering general invariant tests of a hypothesis on the disturbance covariance matrix in a linear regression model. The general results are then specialized to testing for spatial correlation and to autocorrelation testing in time series regression models. We also characterize the situation where the null and the alternative hypothesis are indistinguishable by invariant tests

Efficient Simulation-Based Minimum Distance Estimation and Indirect Inference

Given a random sample from a parametric model, we show how indirect inference estimators based on appropriate nonparametric density estimators (i.e., simulation-based minimum distance estimators) can be constructed that, under mild assumptions, are asymptotically normal with variance-covarince matrix equal to the Cramer-Rao bound.Comment: Minor revision, some references and remarks adde

Confidence Sets Based on Penalized Maximum Likelihood Estimators in Gaussian Regression

Confidence intervals based on penalized maximum likelihood estimators such as the LASSO, adaptive LASSO, and hard-thresholding are analyzed. In the known-variance case, the finite-sample coverage properties of such intervals are determined and it is shown that symmetric intervals are the shortest. The length of the shortest intervals based on the hard-thresholding estimator is larger than the length of the shortest interval based on the adaptive LASSO, which is larger than the length of the shortest interval based on the LASSO, which in turn is larger than the standard interval based on the maximum likelihood estimator. In the case where the penalized estimators are tuned to possess the `sparsity property', the intervals based on these estimators are larger than the standard interval by an order of magnitude. Furthermore, a simple asymptotic confidence interval construction in the `sparse' case, that also applies to the smoothly clipped absolute deviation estimator, is discussed. The results for the known-variance case are shown to carry over to the unknown-variance case in an appropriate asymptotic sense.Comment: second revision: new title, some comments added, proofs moved to appendi

Non-Parametric Maximum Likelihood Density Estimation and Simulation-Based Minimum Distance Estimators

Indirect inference estimators (i.e., simulation-based minimum distance estimators) in a parametric model that are based on auxiliary non-parametric maximum likelihood density estimators are shown to be asymptotically normal. If the parametric model is correctly specified, it is furthermore shown that the asymptotic variance-covariance matrix equals the inverse of the Fisher-information matrix. These results are based on uniform-in-parameters convergence rates and a uniform-in-parameters Donsker-type theorem for non-parametric maximum likelihood density estimators.Comment: minor corrections, some discussion added, some material remove

Can one estimate the conditional distribution of post-model-selection estimators?

We consider the problem of estimating the conditional distribution of a post-model-selection estimator where the conditioning is on the selected model. The notion of a post-model-selection estimator here refers to the combined procedure resulting from first selecting a model (e.g., by a model selection criterion such as AIC or by a hypothesis testing procedure) and then estimating the parameters in the selected model (e.g., by least-squares or maximum likelihood), all based on the same data set. We show that it is impossible to estimate this distribution with reasonable accuracy even asymptotically. In particular, we show that no estimator for this distribution can be uniformly consistent (not even locally). This follows as a corollary to (local) minimax lower bounds on the performance of estimators for this distribution. Similar impossibility results are also obtained for the conditional distribution of linear functions (e.g., predictors) of the post-model-selection estimator.Comment: Published at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/009053606000000821 in the Annals of Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aos/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org