Granger Causality Article Index for
Granger
Limousines in
Granger
Website Links For
Granger
 

Information About

Granger Causality




A time series ''X'' is said to Granger-cause ''Y'' if it can be shown, usually through a series of F-tests on lagged values of ''X'' (and with lagged values of ''Y'' also known), that those ''X'' values provide statistically significant information on future values of ''Y''.

The test works by first doing a regression of ΔY on lagged values of ΔY. Once the appropriate lag interval for Y is proved significant (t-stat or p-value), subsequent regressions for lagged levels of ΔX are performed and added to the regression provided that they 1) are significant in of themselves and 2) add explanatory power to the model. This can be repeated for multiple ΔX's (with each ΔX being tested independently of other ΔX's, but in conjunction with the proven lag level of ΔY). More than 1 lag level of a variable can be included in the final regression model, provided it is statistically significant and provides explanatory power.

The researcher is often looking for a clear story, such as X granger-causes Y but not the other way around. In the real world, often, difficult results are found such as neither granger-causes the other, or that each granger-causes the other.

Here is an example of the function grangertest() in the lmtest library of the R package:


Granger causality test

Model 1: fii ~ Lags(fii, 1:5) + Lags(rM, 1:5)
Model 2: fii ~ Lags(fii, 1:5)
Res.Df Df F Pr(>F)
1 629

  • ---


  • --' 0.001 '
    --' 0.01 '---' 0.05 '.' 0.1 ' ' 1

  • Granger causality test


Model 1: rM ~ Lags(rM, 1:5) + Lags(fii, 1:5)
Model 2: rM ~ Lags(rM, 1:5)
Res.Df Df F Pr(>F)
1 629
2 634 5 1.1804 0.3172


The first Model 1 tests whether it is okay to remove lagged rM from the regression explaining
FII using lagged FII. It is not (p=0.02896). The second pair of Model 1 and Model 2 finds that
it is possible to remove the lagged FII from the model explaining rM using lagged rM. From
this, we conclude that rM granger-causes FII but not the other way around.