Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 August 2011
The classical nonstationary autoregressive models areboth linear and Markov. They include unit root andcointegration models. A possible nonlinear extensionis to relax the linearity and at the same time keepgeneral properties such as nonstationarity and theMarkov property. A null recurrent Markov chain isnonstationary, and β-nullrecurrence is of vital importance for statisticalinference in nonstationary Markov models, such as,e.g., in nonparametric estimation in nonlinearcointegration within the Markov models. The standardrandom walk is an example of a null recurrent Markovchain.
In this paper we suggest that the concept of nullrecurrence is an appropriate nonlineargeneralization of the linear unit root concept andas such it may be a starting point for a nonlinearcointegration concept within the Markov framework.In fact, we establish the link between nullrecurrent processes and autoregressive unit rootmodels. It turns out that null recurrence is closelyrelated to the location of the roots of thecharacteristic polynomial of the state space matrixand the associated eigenvectors. Roughly speakingthe process is β-null recurrent ifone root is on the unit circle, null recurrent iftwo distinct roots are on the unit circle, whereasthe others are inside the unit circle. It istransient if there are more than two roots on theunit circle. These results are closely connected tothe random walk being null recurrent in one and twodimensions but transient in three dimensions. Wealso give an example of a process that byappropriate adjustments can be madeβ-null recurrent for anyβ ∈ (0, 1) and can also be madenull recurrent without being β-nullrecurrent.
We are very grateful to an anonymous referee fortwo extremely careful and detailed reviews ofearlier versions of the paper. These reports haveled to very substantial improvements of the paper.We also thank the chief editor Peter Phillips fora number of comments that have improved ourpresentation by putting our results in betterperspective.