IMF Working Papers

A recent paper by Baba, Hendry, and Starr presents an error-correction model of the demand for M1 in the United States, which shows a dramatic improvement in both fit and stability over earlier models. This note estimates an alternative model with the same data set and draws two conclusions: that the improvements are due more to the use of complex dynamics than to the introduction of variables representing financial innovation, and that some of the economic properties are not robust with respect to minor changes in specification.