Chain-linking Methods in Quarterly National Accounts and Their Impact on Business-Cycle Analysis

In 2005 EU member countries switched their calculations of volume estimates in national accounts from a fixed base year to calculations at previous year prices. In order to get time series of absolute values for volume estimates, chain-linking of growth rates is necessary. While the procedure is quite unambiguous for annual figures, three possible methods exist for quarterly national accounts. Despite the fact that they all result in different output with different time series properties, countries within the EU are free to choose among them and are currently using different approaches. This can lead to differences in quarter-on-quarter growth rates – the main focus of business cycle analysis – even when using the same data set.