An Attempt to Predict Recession for the Indian Economy Using Leading Indicators

Every economy is subject to cyclical fluctuations, so it is desirable for policy makers to explore measures that may be taken in advance to ameliorate them. This paper attempts to do so for Indian economy. Growth Cycles and Growth Rate Cycles have been identified with the help of the Bry-Boschan (BB) Procedure, using data for the Index of Industrial Production (IIP). The corresponding Composite Index of Leading Indicators (CILI) for the growth cycle reference series has been constructed using Euro area Leading Indicator Index (EURO_LI), Bombay Stock Exchange-30 price index (BSE_SENSEX), United States Leading Indicator Index (US_LI), Index of Industrial Production- Manufacturing (IIP_MANF), Spread calculated as the difference between Monthly Average of secondary market yield on Government Securities with residual maturity of 10 years and 15-91 days (SPREAD_10_15_91), and Non-oil Imports (NOIL_IMPORTS). And CILI for the growth rate cycle reference series is constructed with leading indicators like Aggregate Deposits of Scheduled Commercial Banks (ADSCB), Bank Credit of Scheduled Commercial Banks (BCSCB), Gold Price (GP_MUMBAI), Index of Industrial Production- Manufacturing (IIP_MANF), and Broad Money (M3). Both composite indices are constructed by employing Principal Component Analysis (PCA). The results indicate that the Indian economy has experienced six growth cycles and five growth rate cycles during the period 1997:06 to 2017:06. The average duration of leads for peak and trough in growth cycles is reported to be 6.4 months and 7.8 months respectively, while the same for growth rate cycles is five months for peaks and three months for troughs. The probability of witnessing a recession in growth and growth rate cycles with forecast horizons of three, six, nine and 12 months, is in the vicinity of 0.4.