Estimation for conditional moment models based on martingale difference divergence

Abstract

We provide a new estimation method for conditional moment models via the martingale difference divergence (MDD). Our MDD-based estimation method is formed in the framework of a continuum of unconditional moment restrictions. Unlike the existing estimation methods in this framework, the MDD-based estimation method adopts a non-integrable weighting function, which could capture more information from unconditional moment restrictions than the integrable weighting function to enhance the estimation efficiency. Due to the nature of shift-invariance in MDD, our MDD-based estimation method can not identify the intercept parameters. To overcome this identification issue, we further provide a two-step estimation procedure for the model with intercept parameters. Under regularity conditions, we establish the asymptotics of the proposed estimators, which are not only easy-to-implement with expectation-based asymptotic variances, but also applicable to time series data with an unspecified form of conditional heteroskedasticity. Finally, we illustrate the usefulness of the proposed estimators by simulations and two real examples.