Logo image
Inference for Heterogeneous Effects using Low-Rank Estimation of Factor Slopes
Journal article   Peer reviewed

Inference for Heterogeneous Effects using Low-Rank Estimation of Factor Slopes

Yinchu Zhu, Yuan Liao, Christian Hansen, and Victor Chernozhukov
The Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol.2026
03/24/2026

Abstract

Econometrics
We study a panel data model with heterogeneous effects, allowing slopes to vary across individuals and time. To reduce dimensionality, we assume these slopes follow a factor structure, so slope matrices can be estimated via low-rank regularized regression. We propose a multi-step estimation procedure incorporating sample splitting and partialing-out to enable valid inference after penalized estimation. We establish the asymptotic normality of the resulting estimator, facilitating inference for individualtime- specific effects and their cross-sectional averages. The method’s performance is illustrated through simulations and an empirical application.

Metrics

1 Record Views

Details

Logo image