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Multinational Firms, FDI Flows and Imperfect Capital Markets

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Author Info
Pol Antrà s
Mihir A. Desai
C. Fritz Foley

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Abstract

This paper examines how costly financial contracting and weak investor protection influence the cross-border operational, financing and investment decisions of firms. We develop a model in which product developers have a comparative advantage in monitoring the deployment of their technology abroad. The paper demonstrates that when firms want to exploit technologies abroad, multinational firm (MNC) activity and foreign direct investment (FDI) flows arise endogenously when monitoring is nonverifiable and financial frictions exist. The mechanism generating MNC activity is not the risk of technological expropriation by local partners but the demands of external funders who require MNC participation to ensure value maximization by local entrepreneurs. The model demonstrates that weak investor protections limit the scale of multinational firm activity, increase the reliance on FDI flows and alter the decision to deploy technology through FDI as opposed to arm's length licensing. Several distinctive predictions for the impact of weak investor protection on MNC activity and FDI flows are tested and confirmed using firm-level data.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 12855.

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Date of creation: Jan 2007
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:12855

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
F21 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Investment; Long-Term Capital Movements
F23 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - Multinational Firms; International Business
G32 - Financial Economics - - Corporate Finance and Governance - - - Financing Policy; Capital and Ownership Structure
L24 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Contracting Out; Joint Ventures

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Full references

Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Kalina Manova, 2008. "Credit Constraints, Heterogeneous Firms, and International Trade," NBER Working Papers 14531, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Michael Tomz & Mark L. J. Wright, 2008. "Sovereign Theft: Theory And Evidence About Sovereign Default And Expropriation," CAMA Working Papers 2008-07, Australian National University, Centre for Applied Macroeconomic Analysis. [Downloadable!]
  3. Ju, Jiandong & Wei, Shang-Jin, 2007. "Domestic Institutions and the Bypass Effect of Financial Globalization," CEPR Discussion Papers 6343, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  4. Mihir A. Desai & Dhammika Dharmapala, 2007. "Taxes, Institutions and Foreign Diversification Opportunities," NBER Working Papers 13132, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  5. Lee Branstetter & C. Fritz Foley, 2007. "Facts and Fallacies about U.S. FDI in China," NBER Working Papers 13470, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Andrei Shleifer, 2007. "The Economic Consequences of Legal Origins," NBER Working Papers 13608, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  7. Juan Carluccio & Thibault Fally, 2008. "Global sourcing under imperfect capital markets," PSE Working Papers 2008-69, PSE (Ecole normale supérieure). [Downloadable!]
  8. Noriyuki Yanagawa, 2008. "Financial Imperfection and Outsourcing Decision," CIRJE F-Series CIRJE-F-586, CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo. [Downloadable!]
  9. Kalina Manova & Zhiwei Zhang, 2008. "China's exporters and importers: firms, products, and trade partners," Working Paper Series 2008-28, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. [Downloadable!]
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