The Effects of Currency Depreciation on Industry Trade Flows between Malaysia and China

ABSTRACT

This article investigates the impact of real depreciation of ringgit/yuan on Malaysian bilateral trade with her largest trading partner, China, over the period of 1987 to 2013. Using disaggregated import and export data from 39 industries, the results from the bounds testing approach to co-integration and error-correction model reveal that the real bilateral exchange rate has short- and long-run effects in the majority of the industries. However, the short-run effects shift into the long run in nine out of 20 import industries and in 13 out of 20 export industries. Most of these are small industries producing intermediate goods.     

Effect of exchange rate volatility on industry trade flows between Malaysia and China

This paper investigates the impact of ringgit/yuan volatility on Malaysian trade with her largest trading partner, China. The short- and long-run impacts are estimated using bounds testing approach to cointegration analysis and disaggregated bilateral trade data by industry over the period of 1985–2010. Specifically, we considered a total of 151 importing and 24 exporting industries in Malaysia that traded with China. Our finding indicates that cointegration existed in 94 Malaysian import industry models and 16 Malaysian export industry models. Among these cases, exchange rate volatility has short-run effects on majority of the models. However, the short-run effects shift into the long-run effects in 46 out of 69 industries in import models and 5 out of 10 industries in export models. Results indicate that the exchange rate uncertainty has positive effects on majority of these industries.     

Exchange rate volatility and ASEAN-4’s trade flows: is there a third country effect?

This paper investigates the impact of exchange rate volatility on the trade flows among ASEAN-4 countries (Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand) as well as to their five main trading partners. External volatility is included in the models to study the ‘third country’ effect on the trade flows. We employ annual import and export data over the period of 1980–2012. The results from the bounds testing approach to cointegration and error-correction model reveal that the real exchange rate volatility does play a significant role in 15 export and four import models in short-run and long-run. Moreover, in both import and export models, the effects of exchange rate volatility on trade flows are negative rather than positive. Finally, the effects of volatility from the ASEAN-4’s currency/yuan rate dominate the third country effect on the ASEAN-4’s trade.     

How responsive are trade flows between Malaysia and China to the exchange rate? Evidence from industry data

This paper investigates the impact of currency depreciation on bilateral trade between Malaysia and China, especially how a real depreciation of ringgit against the yuan on each industry’s inpayments and outpayments affect the trade balance. We employ disaggregated quarterly data on import and export for 52 industries over the period 1993Q1 to 2012Q4. The results from the bounds testing approach to the cointegration and error-correction model reveal that the real bilateral exchange rate has short and long-run effects on the inpayments and outpayments of the industries. However, the short-run effects shift into the long run in 14 out of 35 industries in the inpayment models and 17 out of 44 industries in the outpayments models. Most of these are small industries producing intermediate goods. According to the ML condition, the depreciation of ringgit against yuan improves Malaysia’s trade balance with China in these industries.