Regional trade agreement and foreign direct investment

This paper investigates the relationship between regional trade agreements, such as the NAFTA, and FDI. Using a fixed-effects gravity model to estimate OECD panel data spanning 1982–1997, we learn that trade integration encourages FDI. We find specific evidence for each of the NAFTA member countries—Mexico, Canada and the United States. In addition, we find evidence that FDI will rise with host and parent country GDP and fall with distance.     

Corporate financial determinants of foreign direct investment

Financial market incompleteness and (partial) segmentation of financial markets internationally may endow some firms with a financial advantage which can be exploited through foreign direct investment. We argue that this advantage appears as a distinct cost-of-capital effect on FDI, and identify possible channels for such an effect. Using a sample of European firms’ cross-border acquisitions, and controlling for traditional firm-level determinants of FDI, we find strong support for a cost-of-equity effect, whereas the effect of debt costs is indeterminate. Moreover, financial FDI determinants are more important for firms with high knowledge intensity and for firms resident in relatively less financially developed countries.     

利用外国直接投资的风险与防范

文章分析了外国直接投资的引入在促进我国经济发展的同时,也带来了行业垄断、技术依赖等风险,这些风险的存在增加了我国经济运行的不稳定性,并在对这些风险进行分析的基础上提出了相应的防范措施。     

The role of inward foreign direct investment on entrepreneurship

This paper investigates whether foreign firms had a positive impact on entrepreneurial activity measured by the net creation of firms. Using firm-level panel data for the Portuguese manufacturing and service industries over the period 1986 to 2000, we test whether the impact of foreign firms on firms’ entry depends on the number and size of previous foreign entrants. Overall, the results cast some doubts on the influence of foreign firms in assisting entrepreneurial activity. The impact of a first foreign investment is, in general, positive but the marginal impact of additional investments appears to be negative.     

Political culture and foreign direct investment: The case of Italy

Does the political culture of an area have any impact on the foreign direct investment (FDI) decisions of multinational corporations (MNCs)? This question is difficult to address empirically, as locations differ in many dimensions. We therefore address this question by examining MNC investment location decisions with regard to different regions within a single country. The country we examine is Italy, which exhibits one of the highest levels of variation with regard to the political culture of its geographical regions. We find that political culture as represented by the pattern of support for political parties at different points on the political spectrum has a significant impact on the MNC investment location decision. Thus, in choosing between locations on a short list, where economic and financial location factors are roughly similar, political culture can have a determining influence. In the case of Italy, a Center-right orientation is conducive to MNC FDI, while a Center-left orientation is not. A Far-left orientation is found to have a very negative effect on FDI.     

外商直接投资对我国就业的影响--一个综合分析框架

利用外商直接投资是我国政府增加和扩大就业的政策措施之一。外商直接投资是否能够实现我国政府增加和扩大就业的目标,这是值得深入研究的一个重大课题。目前的大多数研究只注意到了外商直接投资对我国就业的积极影响,过分夸大了外商直接投资对我国就业的贡献,而忽视了其负面影响。为了全面了解外商直接投资对我国的就业效应,有必要从外商直接投资的就业创造效应、就业损失效应、就业挤出效应和就业转移效应四个方面进行详细分析,在此基础上进行必要的政策调整。     

Political events and the foreign direct investment decision: An empirical examination

This study investigates the impact of political events on US manufacturing direct investment in Latin America. The relationship between foreign direct investment and political events (and economic factors) is examined through regression analysis of pooled time-series (21 years) and cross-sectional (8 countries) data. In contrast to previous studies using an econometric approach, this study finds that political events do affect direct investment decisions. Specifically, both intra-nation and inter-nation conflict and co-operation have an impact on US direct investment decisions concerning Latin American countries. In addition, the host country's market size and market growth affect these decisions by US multinational firms.     

湖南省利用外商直接投资的特征分析

湖南省作为实现"中部崛起"战略的重要成员,其利用外资水平与国内发达省份相比有较大差距,文章分析了湖南省外商直接投资的阶段特征、区位分布特征和来源地特征,并对湖南省吸引外资流入提出了政策建议。     

我国吸引外国直接投资对技术创新的影响

引进技术不等于引进技术创新能力,技术和技术能力是两个有本质区别的概念。在一定条件下,技术可以引进,但技术创新能力不可能引进。我国的产业体系要消化吸收国外先进技术并使之转化为自主的知识资产,就必须建立以企业为主的自主开发平台,培养锻炼自己的技术开发队伍,进行技术创新的实践。     

Crises, portfolio flows, and foreign direct investment: An application to Turkey

We analyze how financial and economic crises affect the relation between the components of capital flows and their determinants in an emerging economy. Our results suggest that the composition of capital flows matters, crises can explain the volatility of portfolio flows and foreign direct investment, and modeling them as endogenous breakpoints improves the results considerably. By using data from the Turkish economy, we estimate these breakpoints together with the parameters of the model and find that they correspond to international and domestic crises that hit the country. Although both components are affected by similar crises, direct investment reacts strongly to the domestic crisis, while portfolios flows are more sensitive to global financial conditions. Breaks also have an effect on the significance and sign of determinants of each type of international investment. Evidence indicates changes in all coefficients in both investment types and suggests that analyses assuming parameter constancy lead to misleading results if they ignore the influence of endogenous breaks.     

Location choice for direct foreign investment in new hospitals in China by using ANP and TOPSIS

This study models location choices for foreign direct investments in new hospitals in China as an multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) problem and designs develops a multidirectional relationship decision model combines the techniques of analytic network process (ANP) and technique for order performance based on similarity to the ideal solution (TOPSIS). This study discusses applying ANP to the relative weighting of multiple assessment criteria. The TOPSIS approach is employed to rank 15 counties without the Zhoushan of China’s Yangtze River Delta (YRD) region in terms of their overall performance under the decision model. To illustrate how the proposed approach is applied to the problem of selecting locations for new hospitals in China an empirical study of a real case is performed. This study demonstrates the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed assessment procedure.     

The effects of labour costs and workplace constraints on foreign direct investment among highly industrialized countries

Drawing on economic propositions underlying theories of foreign direct investment and organizational propositions underlying international human resource management strategic decision making, the theoretical model developed herein integrates two distinct but interrelated strategic HRM assessments. In deciding where to invest, multinational companies (MNCs) assess both (1) the net comparative labour cost advantages associated with alternative host-country IR systems and (2) the comparative flexibility afforded them by alternative IR systems to either transfer or create preferred HRM strategies abroad. The results of the present study indicate that, on average, MNCs from the major investor countries of the world give substantial weight to differences in national IR systems in deciding how much to invest across alternative high-skill, highwage countries. In particular, the evidence indicates that MNCs have invested more in countries with higher skills, lower compensation costs and lesser government and collective bargaining constraints on MNCs' flexibility to set the terms and conditions of employment or otherwise deploy preferred HRM practices abroad.     

投资中国：国际资本进行时

当全球零售行业老大沃尔玛即将斥巨资收购中国零售企业好又多的最新消息通过媒体高调释放出来之后，当世界最大的信息工业跨国公司IBM日前宣布将其全球采购总部从纽约移师到中国深圳的声音清晰落地时．先前投射到中国政府一系列外资管理新规上的所有质疑和批评都消弭无声，中国成为未来全球资本降落的理想市场也日渐明朗。     

资本市场开放推动经济均衡发展和技术创新

中国经济发展的不均衡影响到发展的可持续性,本文重点讨论了对经济不均衡发展的承受能力和转向均衡发展的有效路径,考察了对经济竞争力有重要影响的制度改革、人力资源成本、内外投资环境和规模效应等四个方面的因素,以期通过对这些要素进行合理调整,借助资本市场开放,推进制度创新和技术创新,在保持竞争力的情况下,优化产业结构,使经济均衡发展。     

The impact of deviation from relative purchasing power parity equilibrium on U.S. foreign direct investment

Analyzing inbound and outbound foreign direct investment (FDI) between the U.S. and seven developed countries over the period from 1994 to 2004, this study provides strong evidence for a positive relationship between aggregate FDI flows and a strengthening of a home currency. Further, taking exchange rate disequilibrium into account, we find that an increase in U.S. inbound FDI is related to a strengthening of an undervalued and overvalued U.S. dollar, while an increase in U.S. outbound FDI (foreign inbound FDI) is mainly related to a strengthening of an overvalued foreign currency. Disaggregate FDI flow data show that these findings hold mainly for the manufacturing (food and machinery) and the wholesale industry. We argue that our findings may provide evidence for a co-existence of the wealth-effect hypothesis and a more profit and production oriented hypothesis, once the U.S. dollar is undervalued. Additionally, the results support the argument that the profit and production oriented hypothesis dominates the wealth effect in developed countries, especially in the manufacturing and wholesale industry. Moreover, the results support the view that foreign investors are interested in how overvalued or undervalued a currency is, rather than being interested only in the recent direction of change in the exchange rate. Finally, all findings are robust with respect to several estimation procedures.     

国际分工格局下的中国制造业与外资引入

文章首先概述了中国制造业的发展特征,在中国制造业日益纳入国际分工的格局下,对制造业的比较优势进行了实证分析,在此基础上明确分析了中国制造业"世界制造中心"的定位和国际竞争力,最后阐述了制造业在对外开放中外资引入的选择性吸收策略。     

The effect of (the absence of) multinationals'' foreign direct investment on the level of Eastern European trade

Identifying the most important systemic characteristics that have determined the behavior of CPEs is crucial for the choice of a transition path within the ongoing economic reforms in these countries. The empirical literature on the comparative behavior of CPEs and MEs often gives little help in explaining exactly why the economic performance of CPEs differs from that of MEs. This is certainly the case for studies that have previously examined the comparative levels of CPE trade. Employing the data and methodology of an existing study (Browning, 1985), and adding a variable representing the level of MNC activity in each country, it is shown that the low levels of CPE trade can be completely explained by the NMC activity, without recourse to other effects of the economic system.Abbreviations CPE Centrally Planned Economy - ME Market Economy - MNC Multinational Corporation - CMEA Council for Mutual Economic Assistance     

Capital investment and determinants of financial constraints in Estonia

Unlike previous empirical work concerning investment behavior and the determinants of liquidity constraints, we use a switching regression framework when sample separation is unknown and endogenous and firms are assumed to operate either in the financially constrained or in the financially unconstrained regime. By using new panel data for Estonian companies during 1993–2002 we find that: (i) investment behavior is characterized by two distinct regimes; (ii) the likelihood of being financially constrained is higher in firms that are recently privatized, small and where ownership is concentrated in the hands of insiders and the state; (iii) the actual probabilities of operating in the financially constrained regime are quite high and essentially stable during the whole period under consideration; (iv) ownership structure affects investment beyond its indirect effects through financial constraints.     

中国对东盟直接投资存在的问题及对策

东盟各国经济发展不平衡,需求层次多样,是一个极具发展潜力的经济体,近年来,中国对东盟投资规模正不断扩大。文章首先分析了中国对东盟直接投资的现状,在此基础上指出了中国对东盟直接投资存在的问题,最后提出了解决问题、进一步促进中国对东盟直接投资的对策建议。