Effects of USD–Euro parity on a small open economy: evidence from Turkey

This study assesses the effect of USD–Euro parity on a small open economy where exports are predominantly denominated in Euros and imports are denominated in USD. Empirical evidence from Turkey suggests that a positive change in the USD value of the Euro appreciates the local currency, decreases inflation and increases output.     

The J-curve: evidence from commodity trade between US and China

In testing the short-run (J-curve effect) and the long-run effects of currency depreciation on the trade balance many researchers have used either trade data between one country and the rest of the world or between one country and another trading partner. Both groups are said to suffer from aggregation bias. To reduce the bias, in this article we consider trade data between one country (the US) and her trading partner (China) disaggregated by commodity. We use imports and exports of 88 industries (2-digit and 3-digit classifications) and cointegration analysis to show that the trade balance of at least 34 of the industries react favourably to real depreciation of the dollar. The J-curve effect is detected in 22 industries. Furthermore, most of these industries that are sensitive to currency depreciation are durable commodity groupings.     

International trade and macroeconomic dynamics: The case of U.S. bilateral trade with G-7 countries

The short- and long-run effects of exchange rates, income, interest rates and government spending on U.S. bilateral trade with the other G-7 countries are investigated using an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model. The primary contribution of this study is to consider separating the analysis of exports and imports in an integrated model that empirically encompasses four major schools of thoughts – elasticity, Keynesian income, absorption and monetary approaches – in order to identify macroeconomic linkages to U.S. bilateral trade with the other G-7 countries accurately. Results suggest that, in both the short- and long-run, U.S. imports and exports are highly sensitive to changes in U.S. and foreign income, while U.S. imports and exports are relatively insensitive to changes in bilateral exchange rate. It is also found that both exports and imports are more responsive to changes in government spending than changes in interest rates in both the short- and long-run.     

Export and import composition as determinants of bilateral trade in goods: evidence from Russia

Conventional theory and several empirical studies state that incomes and exchange rates are the key determinants of the trade balance. Here, we argue that export and import composition are also key explanatory variables because some goods are inelastic and/or with a high added value, directly and indirectly affecting income and price elasticities and trade balance. Thus, if exports and/or imports significantly consist of price inelastic products, then, a positive and a negative effect, respectively, should be expected on the trade balance. Using bilateral trade data and dynamic panel models, we found that the ratio of exports of crude petroleum and natural gas (price inelastic goods) to total exports is significantly and positively associated with the Russian trade balance in goods. For its part, Russian imports of high-tech goods (income elastic and price inelastic with a high added value) show a negative association. The goods balance of Russia also responded to changes in relative income, but there is only weak evidence of reactions to changes in the exchange rate. These findings partially explain the persistent surplus in the Russian trade balance and current account.     

Does devaluation improve trade balance in small island economies? The case of Fiji

A number of countries, mostly small and island economies manage fixed exchange and often devalue it as a stabilisation strategy. The current paper investigates the effectiveness of devaluation in improving trade balance with reference to Fiji. A small island economy has limited exportable and hence highly depends on imports for both consumption and production purposes. A devaluation, therefore, inflates domestic price and appreciates the real exchange immediately by raising importable consumption and discouraging imports used in domestic production. The paper applies various econometric models for empirical investigation of its impact and transmission mechanism. Strong long-run relationship found between real exchange rate and trade balance explains that appreciation of currency has been responsible for the rising trade deficit in the economy. Moreover, the devaluation did not demonstrate J-curve phenomenon. The effect of devaluation strongly contributed to the domestic inflation has been while quite weak on stimulating aggregate demand.     

An empirical examination of the currency denomination of trade

The currency denomination of trade has important effects on inflation and the macroeconomic transmission of shocks. This study examines the currency denomination of Italian exports and imports with countries outside the European Union during 2010. By using a unique dataset we find evidence to suggest that invoicing currencies do not always have consistent determinants. Significant effects, new to the literature, include the massive, robust effect of geography and tax treaties, which suggest the importance of information asymmetry. The distance between trading partners has one of the largest marginal effects, increasing the likelihood of vehicle currency use relative to the euro.     

Are shocks to the terms of trade shocks to productivity?

International trade is frequently thought of as a production technology in which the inputs are exports and the outputs are imports. Exports are transformed into imports at the rate of the price of exports relative to the price of imports: the reciprocal of the terms of trade. Cast this way, a change in the terms of trade acts as a productivity shock. Or does it? In this paper, we show that this line of reasoning cannot work in standard models. Starting with a simple model and then generalizing, we show that changes in the terms of trade have no first-order effect on productivity when output is measured as chain-weighted real GDP. The terms of trade do affect real income and consumption in a country, and we show how measures of real income change with the terms of trade at business cycle frequencies and during financial crises.     

EXCHANGE RATE PROBLEMS IN NATIONAL ACCOUNTING OF DEVELOPING COUNTRIES*

Developing countries which typically have import surpluses and inflationary pressures because of insufficient savings are prone to use indirect taxes on imports (Tm) and subsidization of exports (Sx) in order to prevent deterioration of the balance of trade. If these substitutes for devaluation are included in the net indirect tax component of product at current market prices (Ym) the import surplus is likely to be understated, and Ym upward biased. This distortion will be avoided if imports and exports are measured at effective exchange rates (ER), that is, at official rates (OR) plus Tm and Sx respectively, and if (Tm - Sx) is deducted from the net indirect tax component of Ym. Only in this manner become imports and exports consistent with the other uses and resources at market prices and can be articulated with them. At base-year prices the volume index of product at OR diverges from that of ER to the degree that the composition of imports and exports in regard to tax and subsidy rates computed ad valorem significantly changes. Such a case is similar to that of the price indexes of imports and exports moving in diverging proportions: the trade balance at base-year prices will differ from that at current prices. The resulting discrepancies in national accounts have led to proposals of deflating, for example, exports by the price index of imports. Suchlike approaches are incompatible with the principle of national accounting that prices are supposed already to measure substitution values. Deflating exports by import prices means reintroducing substitution values, as does, for example, deflation of incomes by a consumer price index. Correspondingly, since the trade balance at ER conceptually expresses the value of imports at domestic market prices as compared to the corresponding domestic market value of exports, and if at ER the trade balance diverges from that at OR, the former balance has an important meaning (as has the trade balance at base-year prices as compared to that at current prices) and the resulting discrepancy between the two measures should not be removed merely for the sake of accounting smoothness. In contrast to the market price approach, the measurement of product at base-year factor cost is indifferent to the measurement of the trade balance at ER and at OR. It is, therefore, proposed in countries in which part of import taxation and export subsidization substitutes for devaluation, to record imports and exports in the national accounts at effective exchange rates, and to correct the net indirect tax component of product correspondingly. Imports and exports at official exchange rates should be shown within the balance of payments, and the latter separately as a memorandum item.     

Habit persistence and the structure of international commodity trade

The paper analyzes the commodity structure of exports and imports of nine industrialized countries, using a dynamic version of the Linear Expenditure System. The hypothesis implied by this approach is that the structure of commodity trade can be explained by a combination of habit persistence and constant marginal expenditure shares. Application of the model to the trade composition of nine countries shows that there are considerable differences in the strength of habit persistence across countries and across commodity groups as well as between exports and imports. These are crucial for the explanation of the associated expenditure and price elasticities.     

Intra-good trade in Germany: a first look at the evidence

This article contributes to the literature by using newly released comprehensive transaction-level data on all exports and imports to document facts about the amount of intra-good trade – the simultaneous export and import of identical goods by one firm – in Germany. Combined data for trade transactions and for characteristics of a representative large sample of trading firms are then used to report differences between firms that export and import different goods only (inter-good traders) and firms that engage in the simultaneous export and import of identical goods (intra-good traders). We find that the share of intra-good trade in total trade was some 17% in Germany in 2012. Intra-good trade matters. This share differs widely between broadly defined groups of goods and between industries. Controlling for detailed industry affiliation, intra-good traders differ significantly from inter-good traders – they are larger, more human capital intensive, more productive, have a higher R&D intensity and are more profitable. The data, however, are not rich enough to reveal the direction of causality between intra-good trade and firm performance and to investigate empirically the reasons why some firms engage in intra-good trade.     

Tourism,trade and growth: the case of Cyprus

Although the relationship between international trade and economic growth has found a wide application area in the literature over the years, this can not be said about tourism and growth or trade and tourism. This study employs the bounds test for cointegration and Granger causality tests to investigate a long-run equilibrium relationship between tourism, trade and real income growth, and the direction of causality among themselves for Cyprus. Results reveal that tourism, trade and real income growth are cointegrated; thus, a long-run equilibrium relationship can be inferred between these three variables. On the other hand, Granger causality test results suggest that real income growth stimulates growth in international trade (both exports and imports) and international tourist arrivals to the island. Furthermore, growth in international trade (both exports and imports) also stimulates an increase in international tourist arrivals to Cyprus. And finally, real import growth stimulate growth in real exports in the case of Cyprus.     

EU participation and the external trade of Greece: an appraisal of the evidence

This paper investigates the trade effects caused by the accession of Greece to the EU. A large part of the analysis is in terms of trade flows disaggregated by the 21 categories of the Greek Tariff Schedule. These series are original data sets which have been constructed by the author to be used here for the first time. The main message is that after 1981 events took a turn closer to the pessimistic pre-accession predictions. Our findings indicate that during the post-integration period the external trade of Greece has been reoriented towards the EU countries and Greece lost part of its comparative advantage in those sectors in which such an advantage exists. We also suggest that as far as imports are concerned, EU participation has caused gross trade creation for imports from the EU countries and gross trade diversion for imports from the Rest of the World. As far as exports are concerned, the results indicate that EU participation has caused only a modest increase in Greek exports to the EU market.     

The effect of the euro on aeronautic trade: A French regional analysis

After describing the spatial distribution of the aeronautic industry in France, this study analyzes the determinants of French regional bilateral exports and imports, according to a trade gravity model, for the period 2003–2010. The appreciation of the euro has a negative impact on exports and a positive effect on imports, confirming the fears of European politicians and managers in the aeronautic sector. The gravity equation, extended to integrate factor complementarities among partners, also shows that labor productivity levels in France and its partner countries are significant determinants of trade, supporting O-ring theory applied from Kremer (1993) to explicate trade in the aeronautical sector. The spatial organization of this sector is also analyzed via the impact of foreign military spending on French trade. Finally, by distinguishing French imports and arrivals of products manufactured in Europe and in France, supplementary estimations reveal that outward foreign direct investment FDI affects the imports and arrivals of European products negatively but has positive influences on the imports and arrivals of French products.     

The economic and trade effects of the UK–Korea free trade agreement on the United Kingdom,Korea, Japan,China, and the European Union

We explored a comparative static computable general equilibrium model with six regions and 12 sectors to estimate the impacts of the recent UK–Korea free trade agreement (FTA) along with the European Union (EU)–Korea FTA. The empirical results provide quantitative evidence of the impact on national GDP, national exports and imports by sector, and the changes in exports or imports among the United Kingdom, Korea, Japan, China, and the EU. The UK–Korea FTA, along with the EU–Korea FTA, increases GDP and welfare for the United Kingdom and Korea; moreover, there is a large increase in automobiles, transport equipment, and machinery exports between Korea and the United Kingdom. The GDP and welfare level of non-member countries such as Japan and China will slightly decline. Exports from the United Kingdom and Korea to non-member countries are also expected to decrease in most manufacturing sectors. The UK–Korea FTA will lead to increases in imports between the United Kingdom and Korea due to mutual trade creation effects and trade diversion effects. However, non-member countries such as Japan's exports are expected to experience a large decline in automobiles to the United Kingdom and in most manufacturing products to Korea due to the negative impact of the UK–Korea FTA.     

Currency unions and trade: A post-EMU reassessment

In our European Economic Review (2002) paper, we used pre-1998 data on countries participating in and leaving currency unions to estimate the effect of currency unions on trade using (then-) conventional gravity models. In this paper, we use a variety of empirical gravity models to estimate the currency union effect on trade and exports, using recent data which includes the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). We have three findings. First, our assumption of symmetry between the effects of entering and leaving a currency union seems reasonable in the data. Second, our preferred methodology indicates that EMU has boosted exports by around 50%. While other estimation techniques yield different results, a panel approach with both time-varying country and dyadic fixed effects on a large span of data (across both countries and time) seems to deliver insensitive and reliable results. Third, different currency unions have different trade effects.     

Exchange rate effects on Korea–U.S. bilateral trade: A new look

This study examines the effect of exchange rate fluctuations on Korea׳s trade with the U.S. by taking the roles of exchange rate volatility and third country effects into account. An autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach to cointegration is applied to estimate bilateral exports and imports of disaggregating 10 industries between Korea and the U.S. We find that Korea׳s major export industries are highly responsive to the bilateral exchange rate, volatility and third country effects in both the long- and short-run, whereas Korea׳s imports are mostly insensitive to changes in those three factors. It is also found that income in both countries plays an important role in influencing the bilateral trade flows in both the long- and short-run.     

The trade balance and the terms of trade in a two-country two-sector OLG economy

We consider a two-country, two-sector OLG model. It is shown that the trade balance and the relative price of exports are always positively related when exports are labor intensive regardless of the elasticity of intertemporal substitution in consumption. A large response of savings to future prices becomes a sufficient condition for an inverse relation between these variables only if exports are capital intensive. In this case, a rise in the terms of trade can be followed by a trade balance decline if consumption goods are capital intensive and the income effect implied on savings is negative and large.     

Input-output analysis of carbon emissions embodied in China-Japan trade

Energy-related CO₂ emissions embodied in international trade have been widely studied by researchers all over the world. By using the bilateral trade input–output (BTIO) approach, this study investigates the CO₂ emissions embodied in China–Japan trade during 1995–2009 and attempts to identify the driving forces for the change in CO₂ emissions embodied in China’s exports to Japan during that period by using structural decomposition analysis (SDA). Result shows that CO₂ emissions embodied in China’s exports increased by about 100% from 1995 to 2009, whereas those embodied in China’s imports increased by about 500% during the same period. Result of this research also reveals that the scale effect had a large influence on the increase in CO₂ emissions embodied in China–Japan trade. The technical effect greatly decreased CO₂ emissions embodied in China’s exports to Japan, but obviously increased those embodied in imports. The influence of the structural effect was relatively small and insignificant in the change of CO₂ emissions embodied in China’s exports to Japan, but was notable in the change of emissions embodied in imports.     

Trade flows,relative prices,and effective exchange rates: a VAR on Ethiopian data

The dynamic response of trade flows to price and effective exchange rate changes is examined via VAR using quarerly data from Ethiopia for the period 1973(i)–1985(iv). The results show one-way Granger-causality running from prices and exchange rates to imports and exports without significant feedback. Imports and exports exhibit similar response patterns to unexpected changes in relative prices and exchange rates. The responses of imports and exports are larger and the adjustment takes longer when relative prices rather than exchange rates caused a change in international prices. In the long-run, changes in prices account for a larger percentage of the forecast error variances in imports and exports than exchange rate changes. It is shown that devaluation may have an initial adverse effect on the trade balance.