Bayesian Modeling and Forecasting of Double Seasonal Vector Autoregressive Processes

Abstract

A wide range of real-world multivariate time series encountered in practice exhibit two simultaneous and interacting seasonal cycles, for example hourly electricity demand, intraday financial prices, and sub-daily traffic volumes. Existing Bayesian frameworks for vector autoregressive (VAR) processes accommodate at most a single seasonal periodicity, leaving no established methodology for the double seasonal case commonly observed in high-frequency multivariate data. This paper bridges that gap by introducing the double seasonal VAR (DSVAR) models, which extend the univariate double seasonal literature to a coherent multivariate setting. These models are defined through a multiplicative triple autoregressive operator that naturally accommodates the second seasonal cycle. Under a Gaussian error assumption, we derive a comprehensive and analytically convenient Bayesian framework for both modeling and forecasting of DSVAR processes. We consider two prior families: a conjugate matrix normal-Wishart prior which yields exact closed-form inference, and a Jeffreys’ non-informative prior. Under each prior, we derive the marginal posterior distribution of the coefficient matrix as a matrix-t distribution and the marginal posterior of the precision matrix as a Wishart distribution. Moreover, we derive the predictive distribution of future observations as a multivariate-t with an exact analytic form, together with its highest predictive density regions. The methodology is validated through a Monte Carlo simulation experiment and applied to hourly electricity loads in Czech Republic and Germany, two physically interconnected markets with pronounced intraday and intraweek seasonal cycles. Benchmark comparisons against standard VAR, single-seasonal VAR, and univariate seasonal AR models confirm the substantial forecasting gains delivered by the proposed DSVAR framework at both short and long horizons.