  Accurate forecasting of zero coupon bond yields for a continuum of maturities
is paramount to bond portfolio management and derivative security pricing. Yet
a universal model for yield curve forecasting has been elusive, and prior
attempts often resulted in a trade-off between goodness of fit and consistency
with economic theory. To address this, herein we propose a novel formulation
which connects the dynamic factor model (DFM) framework with concepts from
functional data analysis: a DFM with functional factor loading curves. This
results in a model capable of forecasting functional time series. Further, in
the yield curve context we show that the model retains economic interpretation.
Model estimation is achieved through an expectation-maximization algorithm,
where the time series parameters and factor loading curves are simultaneously
estimated in a single step. Efficient computing is implemented and a
data-driven smoothing parameter is nicely incorporated. We show that our model
performs very well on forecasting actual yield data compared with existing
approaches, especially in regard to profit-based assessment for an innovative
trading exercise. We further illustrate the viability of our model to
applications outside of yield forecasting.
