the term structure of interest rates: a first look at the austrian case

abstract: first, the basic idea of the expectations theory on the term structure of interest rates is sketched. a brief review of empirical evidence on the expectations theory is presented. the paper then derives and estimates a term structure equation for austrian interest rates. the empirical results for this equation seem not to be at variance with the basic idea of the expectations theory, i. e., representing the long term interest rates as a weighted average of expected short rates. a little bit of evidence for testing bond market efficiency is also presented. the aim of this paper is to see whether the specific version of the expectations theory used in this paper is reasonably in accord with the available data.