# F6-conf-01 — Does the day of the week carry predictive content for daily changes in the 10-year Treasury yield? ## Scientific question Financial folklore attributes systematic "Monday" or "Friday" patterns to daily asset-price changes. Using twenty years of daily data (2000–2019) on the 10-year US Treasury constant-maturity yield, determine whether the day of the week has any predictive content for the one-day change in the yield. The estimands are: (i) the differences in the conditional mean of the one-day change Δy_t (basis points) across the five weekdays, tested jointly; (ii) the "Monday contrast", the mean change on Mondays minus the mean change on the other four weekdays, with a 95% interval; (iii) the out-of-sample predictive value of weekday-specific means relative to a zero-change (random-walk) baseline. This is a complete, bounded mini-project: question → data audit → baseline → justified method → results → uncertainty → failure discussion → one figure and one table → short report. Report what the data show, whatever that is. ## Inputs - `data/DGS10.csv` — observed data, FRED series DGS10 (Board of Governors, H.15), daily, percent; raw FRED CSV restricted to 2000-01-01 … 2019-12-31 (provenance, URL, retrieval date, terms and SHA-256 in `data/README.md`). Columns: `observation_date` (YYYY-MM-DD, every weekday is listed) and `DGS10` (percent; the field is empty on days when no yield was published, i.e. US market holidays). - `data/README.md` — provenance. ## Information-availability rules - First drop the rows with an empty `DGS10` field; then define the one-day change as Δy_t = 100·(y_t − y_{t−1}) in basis points between consecutive *available* observations. The change is dated t and attributed to the weekday of t (Monday … Friday). The first available observation has no change. - The estimation period is the set of changes dated on or before 2009-12-31; the evaluation period is the set of changes dated on or after 2010-01-01. Any weekday-specific quantity used to forecast an evaluation-period change must be estimated from the estimation period only. - The joint test is the classical one-way (equal-variance) analysis-of-variance F-test of equal weekday means over all changes (both periods together). The Monday contrast and its interval may use any valid two-sample method (Welch, pooled, or a regression on a Monday indicator with heteroskedasticity-robust SE); state the choice. - Use only the file listed above. ## Required outputs - `out/results.json` with the keys: | key | type | unit | meaning | |---|---|---|---| | `n_missing_rows` | integer | rows | rows of `DGS10.csv` with an empty `DGS10` field | | `n_train`, `n_test` | integer | changes | number of daily changes in the estimation and evaluation periods | | `anova_f_stat` | number | — | one-way ANOVA F statistic for equal weekday means (all changes) | | `anova_p_value` | number | — | its p-value (F(4, n−5)) | | `effect_estimate` | number | basis points | Monday contrast: mean Monday change minus mean change on the other weekdays (all changes) | | `effect_ci_low`, `effect_ci_high` | number | basis points | 95% confidence interval for the Monday contrast | | `baseline_metric` | number | basis points | RMSE of the zero-change forecast over the evaluation period | | `model_metric` | number | basis points | RMSE over the evaluation period of the forecast that predicts each change by the estimation-period mean change of its weekday | | `conclusion` | string | — | one of the codes below (decided by the ANOVA at the 5% level; if it rejects, the sign is given by the Monday-contrast interval) | | `task_id` | string | copied from this file | | `feasibility` | string | `complete` / `partial` / `infeasible` | | `feasibility_reason` | string or null | why, if not complete | | `data_issues` | array of {"issue","handling"} | every data problem detected and how it was handled (empty list allowed) | | `n_input_rows` | object {file: integer} | rows read per input file (file name as key, header row excluded) | | `n_analysed` | integer or null | observations actually used in the main estimate | | `random_seed` | integer or null | seed used, if any | (`n_analysed` = number of daily changes used in the ANOVA.) The `conclusion` code must be one of: `positive_effect` (the 95% interval for the effect estimand lies above zero), `negative_effect` (lies below zero), `no_detectable_effect` (the interval / test does not reject zero at the 5% level), `premise_invalid` (the data provided do not allow the stated estimand to be computed — in that case set `feasibility` to `infeasible`, explain in `feasibility_reason`, and set every inestimable key to `null`; never substitute an invented or proxy estimate). - `out/figure1.png` — mean change by weekday with 95% confidence bars (all changes), produced by `out/analysis.py` with matplotlib. - `out/table1.csv` — one row per weekday with columns `weekday`, `n`, `mean_bp`, `se_bp` (header + five data rows), produced by `out/analysis.py`. - `out/report.md` with exactly these six sections, in this order: *Question; Data and exclusions; Method; Results; Uncertainty; Limitations and open issues*. The last section must contain a genuine failure discussion: what would invalidate the result, what was not checked, and what the main threats are. - `out/analysis.py` — replication entry point: `~/wp29/venv/bin/python out/analysis.py`, run from the workspace root, must regenerate `out/results.json`, `out/figure1.png` and `out/table1.csv` from `data/` only, deterministically (fix any seed; use the matplotlib `Agg` backend). - `out/claims.json` — list of the central claims of the report: `[{"id": "C1", "text": "...", "results_keys": ["..."], "status": "supported"|"unsupported"|"not_evaluated", "caveat": "..."}]`. Every claim must reference existing keys of `out/results.json`; a claim must only be marked `supported` if the reported numbers actually support it. ## Constraints - No network access. Python: `~/wp29/venv/bin/python` (numpy, pandas, scipy, statsmodels, matplotlib available). Do not modify `data/`. - Write all deliverables under `out/`. This task is designed to be completed in well under 20 minutes of work; prefer a short, correct chain over an elaborate one.