Statistics Working Paper N. 21 - 2007/1 - This paper presents a comprehensive analysis of the current period performance of the OECD composite leading indicators (CLIs) for 21 OECD Member countries and three zone aggregates (OECD area, Euro area and Major Seven countries) for which CLIs are available for a longer time period. The revisions analysis of OECD CLIs is similar to those recently undertaken by the Organisation for a range of quantitative short-term economic indicators. The aim of the current analysis on CLIs is to further evaluate the quality of the indicator in order to: identify areas where their reliability could be improved; and provide further information to users on their use for economic analyses.

The results show that first estimates of CLIs are revised frequently but the size of revisions is rather small for most countries and almost neglectable for zone aggregates and there is no evidence of bias. They also indicate that there is an improvement in the reliability of the second estimates.