Prognosen von Metallpreisen: Asymmetrische Verlustfunktionen und Rationalität

Abstract

Metals are important industrial raw and basic materials. Owing to the extremely strong fluctuations of metal prices, forecasts of future price developments are often in the focus of reporting by the media. This article analyses forecasts of six different metal prices, where the discussion focuses in particular on the form of forecasters’ loss function and the rationality of forecasts. The micro data we have used show a marked heterogeneity with respect to both aspects both across the analysed metal prices and across the forecasters for some of the metals studied.