Dense Data for Long Memory

From the last post, you might think that efficient learning about low-frequency phenomena requires tall data. Certainly efficient estimation of trend, as stressed in the last post, does require tall data. But it turns out that efficient estimation of other aspects of low-frequency dynamics sometimes requires only dense data. In particular, consider a pure long memory, or "fractionally integrated", process, \( (1-L)^d x_t = \epsilon_t \), 0 < \( d \) < 1/2. (See, for example, this or this.) In a general \( I(d) \) process, \(d\) governs only low-frequency behavior (the rate of decay of long-lag autocorrelations toward zero, or equivalently, the rate of explosion of low-frequency spectra toward infinity), so tall data are needed for efficient estimation of \(d\). But in a pure long-memory process, one parameter (\(d\)) governs behavior at all frequencies, including arbitrarily low frequencies, due to the self-similarity ("scaling law") of pure long memory. Hence for pure long memory a short but dense sample can be as informative about \(d\) as a tall sample. (And pure long memory often appears to be a highly-accurate approximation to financial asset return volatilities, as for example in ABDL.)