A co-integration approach to forecasting container carriers’ time charter rates

A vector autoregressive model was developed for a sample of container carrier time charter rates.Although the series of time charter rates are themselves found non-stationary, thus precluding the use of manymodeling methodologies, evidence provided by co-integration tests points to the existence of stable long-termrelationships between the series. An assessment of the forecasts derived from the model suggests that the spec-ification of these long-term relationships does not improve the accuracy of long-term forecasts. These resultsare interpreted as a corroboration of the efficient market hypothesis.