COVID-19 and trade: Simulated asymmetric loss

This paper uses 2018 data as a benchmark to build a numerical 26-country global general equilibrium model with trade cost and an endogenous trade imbalance structure. We assume that COVID-19 will increase the trade cost between countries and decrease labor supply in production. We use China’s trade data from January to April in 2020 to calibrate the influence level parameters and then simulate the trade effects of COVID-19 in China, the EU, the US, and the world. Our simulation results find that all countries’ trade and exports will be significantly hurt by the pandemic. Due to the trade diversion effect and the price growth effect, some countries will see an increase in import trade. Comparatively, the pandemic has the most negative impact on global trade, followed by the EU, the US, and China. As the pandemic deepens, the negative impact on trade will increase. The worldwide pandemic has the most significant impact on US trade, with an effect about 1.5 times that of the average world effect.     

EU Anti‐dumping Measures against ASEAN Countries: Impact on Trade Flows*

In the present paper, anti‐dumping (AD) duties levied by the European Commission against products from ASEAN countries in the period 1991–2001 have been considered. The ASEAN countries were among the countries most targeted by AD measures imposed by the EU in the 1990s. A panel regression has been applied to estimate the impact of AD duties on trade in some 12 products that have been subject to AD duties targeting ASEAN countries in the period considered. A significant negative impact of AD duties is found, on both the value and the quantity of imports from ASEAN countries. Our estimation provides some (although not overwhelming) indications of trade diversion in favor of EU countries, but no evidence of trade diversion in favor of non‐targeted non‐EU countries.     

China trade: Busting gravity's bounds

Since China's accession to the World Trade Organization in 2001, annual growth rates of its imports and exports have increased, and raised tensions between China and some of its major trading partners. Using a gravity model of trade, we find that China's orientation toward foreign trade is much greater than expected for an economy of its size and level of development. Our analysis shows that China's excessive orientation toward foreign trade (“over-trading”) varies substantially across countries and we consider various explanations for the over-trading. A comparison of China's export boom with the earlier export booms of more market-based East and Southeast Asian economies shows that China's export boom has exceeded earlier booms in magnitude but not in duration. We conclude with a discussion of the likely scale of future export and import flows from and to China.     

欧盟贸易政策的发展趋势及对中欧经贸关系的影响

欧债危机发生以来,欧盟经济饱受债务危机之害,经济严重下滑,失业率节节攀升。为了刺激经济发展,欧盟对其贸易政策做了一系列调整,影响了中欧经贸关系的发展。本文总结了欧债危机发生后欧盟贸易政策的发展趋势,分析了其贸易政策变化对中欧经贸关系的影响,进而提出加强与欧盟沟通、积极进行自贸区谈判等对策,以促进中欧经贸关系的发展。     

Impact of trade cost on China-EU agri-food trade

In this research, we investigate trade costs in relation to China-EU trade in agri-food products during 2001–2015. Major components of trade cost include transportation costs, border-related policy barriers such as tariffs, and local distribution costs. Our results indicate that trade costs between China and EU involving agri-food products, although falling, remain abnormally high. Consequently, we find that trade cost reductions contribute to over half of the overall China-EU trade growth. Our decomposition technique demonstrates that economic growth and trade cost reductions are the key drivers of China-EU trade expansion. Implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) would reduce high trade costs to increase EU-China bilateral agricultural trade significantly. This is not fully captured in the gravity models where a static distance is usually used as a proxy to trade cost. The BRI will not reduce the distance, but it will cut transportation and other components of trade cost for China-EU trade.     

The new goods margin in Japanese–Chinese trade

This paper uses the methodology developed in Kehoe and Ruhl (2013) to measure the change in the extensive, or new goods, margin of trade between Japan and China after China's entry into the World Trade Organization in 2001. The new goods account for 15.9% of Japanese exports to China and 22% of Chinese exports to Japan after trade liberalization. For the case of Chinese exports to Japan, a time series measure shows the growth in new goods coincides with the timing of the trade liberalization.     

US Safeguards on Steel and the Markups of European Producers

This paper is among the first to explore the microeconomic impacts of a trade policy on foreign firms. We empirically investigate the effects of the US safeguard protection of steel imports in 2002 on the markups of EU steel firms. Using a large panel of affected EU steel firms between 1995 and 2005, we find that the protection they faced abroad significantly reduced their markups. Our results indicate smaller adverse effects on multi-product EU firms. Our study has wider implications as it quantifies the cost that trade protection imposes on trading partners, an externality currently not considered in any trade regulation. The US safeguard protection also resulted in some diversion of EU steel especially towards China, aggravating the situation on the Chinese steel market and ultimately resulting in the Chinese trade protection of steel imports. JEL no.  F13, L13, L61     

Restructuring European union trade with central and eastern European countries

Central and eastern European countries (CEECs) participate in the European economy with trade shares of the European Union (EU) and levels of intraindustry trade comparable to peripheral EU countries. However, the opening of CEECs has induced increased specialization in EU countries, which contrasts with the development in previous decades. This partially explains the cautious approach to the eastward enlargement in the EU. Furthermore, CEECs are more similar to each other than to EU countries. The pattern of the CEECs' trade with the EU resembles that of Turkey. Trade diversion is likely to present a significant burden for countries omitted from the first wave of the enlargement.     

Effects of regional integration on FDI: An empirical approach

This study uses an augmented gravity model to capture the effect of regional economic integration on Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) flows in the cases of the EU, NAFTA, MERCOSUR, and ASEAN. Three important conclusions emerge: (i) regional integration has had a positive and significant effect on FDI, which is a combination of investment creation and diversion; (ii) investment diversion does occur in a significant number of cases, and hence it is a legitimate cause for concern, especially among developing countries that are not part of a regional grouping with at least one developed country; and (iii) FDI acts as a substitute for trade in a significant number of cases, although in some cases, it complements trade.     

技术性贸易壁垒的贸易转移效应之实证分析

本文分析了欧盟的技术性标准及法规对中国出口贸易的转移作用,以出口市场份额的变动来反应市场占有率的变化,从而推断出技术性贸易壁垒的转移效应。本文使用WTO/TBT委员会的TBT STC数据库并在对该数据库整理的基础上,搜集了欧盟主要的技术性措施及涉及的产品种类加以整理,采用系统GMM对动态面板数据进行回归。结果显示,欧盟的TBT措施的实施对中国的出口贸易产生了较大的转移作用。文章还特别就中国出口至欧盟的化学品和电子电气产品对TBT措施及关税进行回归,结果发现,TBT措施对这两类产品产生较大的转移作用,而关税的影响并不显着。     

中国当前FTA贸易效应分析与比较

根据2002-2010年中国进出口数据,利用混合效应面板数据模型,考察中国当前FTA的贸易创造效应和贸易转移效应,得出如下结论:中国参与FTA产生的贸易创造效应明显,而贸易转移效应较少;中国参与FTA明显推动了中国出口,而对进口影响因伙伴国不同而有所差异;FTA成立时间越长,体现出的贸易创造和贸易转移效应越明显;FTA的贸易效应与伙伴国经济发展水平密切相关;FTA伙伴国地理距离越近,贸易效应越明显。中国应选择经济互补性强、资源丰富、市场潜力大的国家缔结FTA,逐步扩大区域经济合作的地域范围,建立更广泛的区域经济合作伙伴关系。     

Capturing Regional Trade Effects in the Presence of Other Trade Effects: The Impact of the Europe Agreement on Poland’s Imports

This paper investigates the impact of the Europe Agreement on Poland’s imports using econometric models applied to highly disaggregated trade data. This allows other influences on Poland’s trade patterns to be controlled for, specifically the effects of other trade agreements and for the emergence of China. The paper shows that the Europe Agreement had transitory effects on Poland’s imports, but that the scale of the trade effects and the balance of trade creation and diversion effects is sensitive to model specification. The preferred dynamic specification which allows for heterogeneity of time effects across sectors identifies the Europe Agreement to have net trade-creating effects.      

Cooperate or Antagonize： The EU＇s Dilemma on Anti-dumping and Safeguard Measures against China

I. Introduction During the past two decades, with the gradual intensification of political reform, China’s economy in general and trade in specific are growing dramatically, providing an opportunity for other countries to make contact with China in various fields, especially in trade. In November 2005, Chinese President Hu Jintao had a three-state visit in Europe. He signed a deal with German electronics giant Siemens to supply 60 high-speed ICE trains to China, and Siemens will accordi…     

How much have been the export products changed from homogeneous to differentiated? Evidence from China, Japan, and Korea

Many international trade theories and evidence suggest that trade in homogeneous and differentiated goods is different, and trade performance depends significantly on the extent of product differentiation. First this paper classifies the three countries' export products using Rauch's [Rauch, J. (1999). Networks versus markets in international trade. Journal of International Economics, 48, 7–35] classification scheme. This paper suggests a sophisticated technique to obtain the extent of product differentiation in a country's export, implied by Dixit and Stiglitz [Dixit, A., & Stiglitz, J. (1977). Monopolistic competition and optimum product variety. The American Economic Review, 67, 297–308] model in which the smaller is the elasticity of substitution between varieties the greater is the extent of product differentiation. This is an attempt to identify the extent of product differentiation in each country's export basket by estimates of the elasticity of substitution. The estimated elasticities of substitution vary across countries. The most interesting empirical finding is that the China's export structure has been rapidly shaped into differentiated products. However the extent of product differentiation in Japan and Korea's exports has relatively less varied.     

An eye for an eye? The trade and price effects of China's retaliatory tariffs on U.S. exports

We analyze the trade and price effects of China's retaliatory tariffs on imports from the United States in the period from January 2017 to May 2019. We apply the difference-in-differences approach to the up-to-date China Customs data on imports disaggregated by eight-digit HS product category and source country. We find large reductions in the value and quantity of imports from the US and an almost complete tariff pass-through onto import prices. These results remain robust to extensive changes in the specification and in data sample and to a variety of placebo tests using processing imports or exempted products that were originally included in the tariff lists but removed before implementation. We also find that the trade and price effects are heterogeneous across products, differing either in the end-use or in the ownership types of the importing firm. Similar to recent findings in the US (Amiti et al., 2019, Amiti et al., 2020), our estimates suggest limited terms-of-trade gain due to China's tariff hikes.     

The impact of AFTA on intra-AFTA trade

ASEAN countries have liberalised intra-ASEAN trade over the last 20 years by establishing the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA). This paper aims to examine the impact of trade liberalisation under AFTA on intra-ASEAN trade. By applying a gravity model, we find positive and significant trade creation effects from the tariff elimination for a wide range of products. In addition, the analysis reveals that the elasticity of tariff reduction on imports tends to be much larger than that on exports. Trade creation effects for the new ASEAN members are relatively small compared to those for the old members. Our results show that AFTA has been successful in promoting intra-AFTA trade, while we argue that further expansion may be achieved by increasing the use of AFTA and by reducing/removing non-tariff measures (NTMs) through such ways as improving customs procedures and harmonizing/mutually recognizing product standards.     

Changes in world trade

Summary In the last twenty years world trade has displayed not only a rapid growth rate but also considerable changes in composition of goods and regional structure. In particular the trade in industrial products has strongly increased in both absolute and relative terms. Intra-industry trade has also played an important part in this. Trade policy and regional industrialization are the principal factors explaining the latter phenomenon.The relatively rapid increase in the trade in industrial products in respect of the world production of these goods proves to be a recent phenomenon, which did not occur before 1914. The causes that may be adduced for this — rapid economic growth, lowering of trade barriers and regional economic integration — will probably no longer occur in the near future. The possibility of a slower growth rate for world trade thus seems considerable.The figures for the tables were collected by H. van Harten, econ. cand., and by H. Hoytink, econ. cand., to whom I should like to express my gratitude.     

Estimates of trade effects of Portugal's and Spain's entry to the European union

Summary The paper first analyses the consequences of the entry of the two countries to the E.U. in 1986. We find that both now trade relatively more with each other but that, while Spain's trade with the E.U. and Portugal's import from the E.U. soared, Portugal's export to the E.U. stagnated in relative terms. We try to explain this phenomenon. We also find quite a lot of trade diversion as a consequence of the entries - from Northern as well as from Southern countries. We finally try to find evidence for theories of trade: there is little to say for intra-industry trade while comparative cost theories are sometimes vindicated in their static guise.     

On the measurement of product quality in intra-industry trade: An empirical test for China

A relatively recent development in the intra-industry trade (IIT) literature is the measurement of the simultaneous import and export of quality-differentiated products, commonly known as vertical and horizontal IIT. A recent paper from Azhar and Elliott [Azhar, A. K. M. & Elliott, R. J. R. (2006), On the Measurement of Product Quality in Intra-Industry Trade, Review of World Economics, Vol 142 no 3, pp 476–495] analyses various approaches for disentangling vertical and horizontal IIT and suggests a complementary methodology. To investigate the robustness and sensitivity of the existing approaches we examine data on the nature of trade flows between China and its East Asian neighbours and show that in 2002 China tended to export low quality versions of its manufactured goods to Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines.     

Testing for cointegration with threshold effect between stock prices and exchange rates in Japan and Taiwan

This paper empirically investigates the exchange rate effects of the New Taiwan dollar against the Japanese Yen (NTD/JPY) on stock prices in Japan and Taiwan from January 1991 to Mach 2008. Our study employs the newly threshold error-correction model (TECM) elaborated by Enders and Granger [Enders, W., Granger, C.W.F., 1998. Unit-root tests and asymmetric adjustment with an example using the term structure of interest rates. Journal of Business Economics & Statistics 16, 304–311] and Enders and Siklos [Enders, W., Siklos, P.L., 2001. Cointegration and threshold adjustment. Journal of Business Economics & Statistics 19, 166–176], assuming the nature of the relationship between the variables is on the basis of non-linearity. The empirical evidence suggests that there is a long-run equilibrium relationship between NTD/JPY and the stock prices of Japan and Taiwan during the time period investigated. However, an asymmetric threshold cointegration relationship only exists in Taiwan’s financial market. Furthermore, we extend our research by taking into account the effect of the U.S. exchange rate specifically on Taiwan’s financial market. This research also finds a long-term equilibrium and asymmetric causal relationships between NTD/USD and the stock prices of Taiwan. In addition, the results of TECM Granger-Causality tests show that no short-run causal relationship exists between the two financial assets considered for both countries’ cases. However, in the long run a positive causal relationship running from either the Japan or U.S. exchange rate to the stock prices of Taiwan strongly argues for the traditional approach.