贸易失衡的根源:汇率还是经济结构——基于美国案例的实证分析

本文基于协整理论、Granger因果检验、脉冲响应函数等时间序列处理技术对美国经济结构、财政赤字、汇率与其贸易收支之间的动态关系进行了实证检验。检验结果表明:长期内,实体经济占比的增加会改善贸易收支,虚拟经济占比、财政赤字增加会恶化贸易收支,而汇率水平对于贸易收支的影响不显著;短期内,实体经济占比、虚拟经济占比对贸易收支的影响与长期相一致,财政赤字则相反,而汇率水平的上升在短期内导致贸易盈余的增加,但弹性值有变小的趋势。其政策的含义在于:影响美国贸易收支的主要因素来自其财政赤字及其国内经济结构,即实体经济与虚拟经济创造GDP的比例关系,而非汇率因素。因此,只有通过协调其国内实体经济与虚拟经济的发展,减少财政赤字,收缩储蓄-投资缺口才可以有效地调节贸易失衡问题,而不能一味地强调汇率因素。     

The Effect of Exchange Rate on Bilateral Trade Balance: New Evidence from Malaysia and Thailand

This paper attempts to identify the major economic factors that influence the bilateral trade balances of Malaysia and Thailand with the US and Japan. To this end, an unrestricted VAR model was estimated using quarterly frequency data from 1980: I to 1996: IV. The Johansen results indicate a stable long-run relation between trade and three macro variables: exchange rate, domestic income and foreign income. The main findings of this paper are: (i) the real effective exchange rate is an important variable in the trade balance equation and devaluation improves the trade balances of both economies in the long-run; (ii) the other important variables that determine trade balance include domestic and foreign incomes; (iii) the results indicate no J-curve effect and causal run from exchange rate to trade balance, (iv) the real effects of devaluation are distributed over a period of eight to nine quarters.     

Which Way is “Up” in Upgrading? Trajectories of Change in the Value Chain for South African Wine

Global Value Chain (GVC) analysis uses the concept of upgrading to highlight paths for developing country firms to “move up the value chain,” usually through the lenses of four categories—product, process, functional, and inter-sectoral upgrading. The implicit normative expectation is that these firms move toward producing higher value-added products and/or take on more sophisticated functions along a value chain. In this article, upgrading is approached more broadly as “reaching a better deal,” including a balance between rewards and risk. The case study of South African wine shows that better product quality, improved processes, and some functional upgrading have co-existed with processes of “downgrading,” higher risks, and limited rewards, especially in traditional export markets. A reflection on further conceptual development and directions for empirical research is also provided.     

The elasticities approach in general equilibrium: Real shock dynamics

This paper constructs a general equilibrium model that embodies: the elasticities approach to the trade balance in the long run, but allows for inelastic short run demand; and an asset market approach to the capital account, with uncovered interest parity and consistent expectations.Two policies are examined: increased government expenditure and an increased import tariff. The effects of these policies on net exports, the exchange rate, and other variables are determined. A phase diagram demonstrates the dynamic adjustment paths of the exchange rate and the trade balance, and provides a general equilibrium explanation for overshooting and the J-curve as a result of real shocks. Extensions are made to account for policy pre-announcement, the Laursen-Metzler effect, and large-country effects.     

ESTIMATING EXCHANGE RATE AND BILATERAL TRADE BALANCE RELATIONSHIPS: THE EXPERIENCE OF SUB-SAHARAN AFRICAN COUNTRIES

This paper examines the effects of exchange rate changes on the bilateral trade balance of ten African countries vis‐à‐vis the US using annual data over period 1977‐2002. Both the Johansen and panel cointegration tests find cointegration among the series. The country FMOLS results show that real exchange rate depreciation improves the trade balance in six of ten countries in contrast to Tanzania in which it worsens the trade balance, with no effect found in Ghana, Morocco and Senegal. Foreign real income improves the trade balance in two countries but worsens it in another three. Finally, domestic real income negatively affects the trade balance in four countries but improves it in another three. The three‐panel coefficients are correctly signed and significant at the 1% level.     

中国贸易收支对汇率波动的敏感性分析——基于不同贸易模式的比较研究

本文在理论分析基础之上,通过构建计量模型,利用1994~2009年的季度数据,从实证角度比较分析了不同贸易模式下中国贸易收支对汇率波动敏感性的差异性,结果表明,其敏感性在产品内贸易模式下较之传统产业间和产业内贸易模式下更低。由于中国持续性贸易顺差正是中国融入产品内国际分工体系所致,所以人民币升值并不是解决中国贸易顺差的合理之道。本文研究同时发现,人民币汇率波动对内资企业冲击较之外资企业更大。据此本文认为,尽可能维持人民币汇率稳定,通过攀升产品内分工高端价值链、优化贸易结构、鼓励企业"走出去"等,对于缓解中国贸易顺差更为可行。     

Public Debt and Economic Growth in Emerging Market Economies

This paper empirically studies the relationship between public debt and economic growth for selected emerging market economies by performing panel data estimations. The results reveal a statistically significant positive correlation between public debt and the subsequent growth rate of per capita gross domestic product (GDP). Population and investment are also positively correlated with per capita growth, whereas the initial level of real GDP per capita exerts a negative influence on growth, implying conditional convergence. Other variables such as the inflation rate, the trade balance or the exchange rate do not yield a statistically significant effect with respect to economic growth.     

The choice of an invoicing currency in international trade and the balance of trade impact of currency depreciation

Cross-country differences in the choice of an invoicing currency in international trade is one reason for cross-country differences in estimated exchange rate coefficients in short-run balance of trade equations. If exports are invoiced in domestic currency while imports are invoiced in a foreign currency, a depreciation will increase the domestic currency value of outstanding import contracts, and may cause the balance of trade to fall in the short run. Countries with different invoicing patterns will have different effects on the short-run trade balance following a depreciation. We explore a simple theory of invoicing currency choice, drawing inferences regarding the likely choices for 14 countries. This allows a classification of countries according to the expected short-run balance of trade effect of a currency depreciation. Empirical estimates support the hypothesized groupings based on suggested currency invoicing patterns.     

The Japanese–U.S. trade balance and the yen: Evidence from industry data

While it is often assumed that a country's trade balance will improve in the long-run if its currency is allowed to depreciate, this is not necessarily the case for specific goods. In the short run, the opposite might even take place, as fixed quantities and rising import prices cause the trade balance to deteriorate. In this paper, we apply cointegration methodology to assess the short- and long-run impact of fluctuations in the yen–dollar real exchange rate on Japan's trade balance with the U.S. for 117 industries. We find that depreciation causes the trade balance to improve in the long-run for about one-third of Japanese industries. Most short-run effects are in the same direction, indicating a quick improvement in these industries’ trade balance, rather than a period of deterioration such as a “J-curve.”     

Bilateral Trade Balances of Malaysia with Her 11 Largest Trading Partners: New Evidence from Asymmetry Cointegration

Research on the effects of exchange rate changes on the trade balance is now moving in a new direction, by investigating whether exchange rate changes have symmetric or asymmetric effects. The approach that relies upon separating depreciations from appreciations introduces nonlinearity into the adjustment process and relies upon the nonlinear ARDL approach of Shin et al. [2014. Modelling asymmetric cointegration and dynamic multipliers in a nonlinear ARDL framework, in: R. Sickels and W. Horrace (Eds), Festschrift in Honor of Peter Schmidt: Econometric Methods and Applications, 281–314 (Springer)]. When we applied this new method to the bilateral trade balances of Malaysia with each of her 11 largest partners, we found adjustment asymmetry in all models, short-run impact asymmetry effects and long-run asymmetry effects in the trade balance models between Malaysia and Asian countries.     

Fiscal devaluations: evidence using bilateral trade balance data

We study the effects of fiscal devaluations on the trade balances of European Union countries over the 2000–2014 period using bilateral trade balance data. This enables us to control for the coincidence of tax policy measures in different countries, which is an aspect left unconsidered in previous econometric studies. A fiscal devaluation consisting of a budget-neutral tax shift in the amount of 1% of gross domestic product (GDP) from employers’ social security contributions to value added tax leads to a short-term improvement of bilateral trade balance ranging between 0.3 and 0.6% of GDP. An extrapolation of our baseline estimate to the overall trade balance yields an impact of 4.3% of GDP for the whole sample, which is slightly higher than presented in previous empirical research. Applying extrapolation to the trade deficit countries in the euro area shows that these countries’ balance of trade with the rest of the euro area improves by only 0.75% of GDP. Thus, the magnitude of the fiscal devaluation impact on the trade balance varies significantly across countries, depending on their trade openness, among other potentially relevant factors.     

Exchange Rates and Trade Balance Adjustment: A Multi-Country Empirical Analysis

This study assesses the response of the trade balance to exchange rate fluctuations across a large number of countries. Fixed-effects regressions are estimated for three country groups (industrial, developing and emerging markets) on annual data for 87 countries from 1994 to 2010. The trade balance improves significantly after a real depreciation, and to a similar degree, in the long run for all countries, but the adjustment is significantly slower for industrial countries. Emerging markets and developing countries display relatively fast adjustment. Disaggregation into exports and imports shows that the delayed adjustment in industrial countries is almost entirely on the export side. The rate of adjustment in emerging markets is slowing over time, consistent with their eventual graduation to high-income status. The ratio of trade to GDP is also highly sensitive to the real effective exchange rate, with a real depreciation of 10 % raising the trade/GDP ratio across the sample by approximately 4 %. This result, which presumably reflects movements in the prices of tradables relative to non-tradables, raises questions about the widespread use of the trade/GDP ratio as a trade policy indicator, without adjustment for real exchange rate effects.     

Explaining Nigeria’s Economic Growth: Balance of Payments Constrained Growth Approach With External and Internal Imbalances

This study employs a system estimator to examine the validity of balance of payment constrained growth model in the case of Nigeria. We modified a version of Thirlwall’s model developed by Soukiazis et al. (2014) to incorporate the role of foreign contents in growth process. The new version of the model improves significantly explaining the growth in Nigeria. The outcome of this study shows that imported intermediate and capital goods significantly contribute to manufacturing export and domestic investment growth. However, high reliance on the imports of intermediate goods constrains economic growth. World real income exerts significant effect on aggregate exports, similar arguments could not be established when the manufacturing export sector is considered in isolation. Our results reveal that economic growth in Nigeria is constrained by internal and external imbalances. The study recommends among others increasing the manufactured export share, efficient use of oil rents as well as containing budget deficit within acceptable threshold to position the economy on a viable growth path.     

China＇s Exchange Rate and Financial Repression： The Conflicted Emergence of the RMB as an International Currency

Instability in the worm dollar standard, as most recently manifested in the US Federal Reserve＇s near-zero interest rate policy, has caused consternation in emerging markets with naturally higher interest rates. China has been provoked into speeding RMB ＂internationalization ＂; that is, opening up domestic financial markets to reduce its dependence on the US dollar for invoicing trade and making international payments. However, despite rapid percentage growth in offshore financial markets in RMB, the Chinese authorities are essentially trapped into maintaining exchange controls （reinforced by financial repression in domestic interest rates） to avoid an avalanche of foreign capital inflows that would threaten inflation and asset price bubbles by driving nominal interest rates on RMB assets down further. Because a floating （appreciating） exchange rate could attract even more hot money inflows, the People＇s Bank of China should focus on keeping the yuan/dollar rate stable so as to encourage naturally high wage increases to help balance China ＂s international competitiveness. However, further internationalization of the RMB, as with the proposed Shanghai pilot free trade zone, is best deferred until world interest rates rise to more normal levels.     

升值压力、汇率预期与中美贸易余额

汇率升值对贸易收支的影响效果会因相应的升值预期变化而抵消,所以在升值预期持续存在的条件下,单纯的升值并不能平衡贸易收支。汇率预期受升值压力影响,而中美贸易顺差的扩大是升值压力的重要来源,从而形成一种经济循环:中美贸易顺差增加升值压力,升值压力加强升值预期,升值预期进一步扩大贸易顺差。     

中部地区对外贸易影响因素的实证分析

长期以来,尽管中部地区对外贸易取得了较快地发展,但在全国依然处于比较落后的地位。本文利用最新时间序列数据,通过建立多变量回归模型,对中部地区对外贸易的影响因素进行了实证分析。分析认为,中部地区出口贸易和进口贸易的影响因素存在很大差异。出口贸易影响因素主要是贸易条件、进口贸易和全社会固定资产投资;而进口贸易的主要影响因素是汇率、国内生产总值、外商直接投资和人力资本;很多影响因素对中部地区对外贸易没有起到应有的作用。     

Do exchange rate changes have symmetric or asymmetric effects on the trade balance? Evidence from U.S.–Korea commodity trade

Previous studies of the effects of exchange rate changes on Korea’s trade balance have assumed symmetry between currency depreciation and appreciation. In this paper, we distinguish between the two to show that the effects at the industry level are in fact asymmetrical in most industries for Korea’s bilateral trade with the U.S. We employ an auto-regressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach using quarterly data for the period 1989–2014 for the 79 3-digit industries in which trade between Korea and the U.S. took place. Overall, our model incorporating differentiated responses for appreciation versus depreciation reveals a more significant impact of the exchange rate on commodity trade between Korea and the U.S. than a more standard model that imposes symmetry.     

外贸减速背景下我国政策工具调节效力分析——基于SVAR模型的实证研究

本文运用结构向量自回归SVAR模型,对2003～2011年间我国各项政策工具在调节贸易收支方面的综合效力展开实证分析,并结合理论文献充分阐述各项政策发挥效力的传导机制,力图为中国当前政策搭配决策提供科学的理论与实证依据。本文主要结论是,在调节贸易收支失衡方面,我国货币政策比财政政策更加有效。脉冲响应函数显示,扩张性货币政策能够有效缩小贸易顺差,而且货币政策冲击在10个月后达到最大效力,2年后达到最大累积效力。财政支出扩张对贸易顺差有"先抑制再推动"的作用,但政策效力十分有限。人民币名义汇率的正向冲击能够对贸易收支造成显著的"倒J曲线效应"。与传统观点不同,国内要素价格上调在1年半左右的时间窗口不会抑制反而会扩大贸易盈余。上述实证结论支持在外贸减速背景下继续推进包括工资在内的生产要素价格改革,同时建议货币政策制定时应充分考虑对贸易收支的显著影响。     

本币名义汇率低于真实汇率是保持国际竞争力的有效手段

本文表达了如下想法:①名义汇率围绕真实汇率上下波动的调整,会促使一国国际收支恶化或者改善;②美元对人民币贬值并不一定能够满足马歇尔———勒纳条件和解决中美国际收支失衡问题,因为失衡问题主要是美国的国内因素以及限制对华技术出口与中国商品进口所引起的;③我国作为一个发展中国家,应该适度控制名义汇率,使其低于真实汇率,才能支持劳动力优势,保持国际收支顺差;④国际收支长期盈余,是我国经济增长和经济安全的保证。     

Balance-of-payments policy. Instruments and criteria

Summary In this article the author makes clear that in principle targets of economic policy can serve as criteria for balance of payments policy. The instruments of balance of payments policy are discussed in the light of their practical implications. Exchange rate policy is treated as a means of incomes policy. The author argues that only equilibrium of the balance of payments can be considered as a long term criterium for balance of payments policy in the case of stable exchange rates. In the case of flexible exchange rates the criterium can be found in the degree of domestic economic stability.