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The global financial crisis: trying to understand the global trade downturn and recovery

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  • Anderton, Robert
  • Tewolde, Tadios
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    Abstract

    This paper aims to shed light on why the downturn in global trade during the intensification of the financial crisis in 2008Q4-2009Q1 was so severe and synchronized across the world, and also examines the subsequent recovery in global trade during 2009Q2-2010Q1. The paper finds that a structural imports function which captures the different and time-varying importintensities of the components of total final expenditure can explain the sharp decline in global imports of goods and services. By contrast, a specification based on aggregate total expenditure can not fully capture the global trade downturn. In particular, panel estimates for a large number of OECD countries suggest that the high import-intensity of exports at the country-level can explain a significant proportion of the decline in world imports during the crisis, while declines in the highly import-intensive expenditure category of investment also contributed to the remaining fall in global trade. At the same time, the high and rising import-intensity of exports also reflects and captures the rapid growth in “vertical specialisation”, suggesting that widespread global production chains may have amplified the downturn in world trade and partly explains its high-degree of synchronisation across the globe. In addition, the estimates find that stockbuilding, business confidence and credit conditions also played a role in the global trade downturn. Meanwhile, the global trade recovery (2009Q2-2010Q1) can only be partially explained by differential elasticities for the components of demand (although the results confirm that the upturn in OECD imports was also driven by strong export growth and the associated reactivation of global production chains, as well as the recovery in stockbuilding and the fiscal stimulus). This may be due in part to the many policy measures that were implemented to boost global trade at that time and which can not be captured by the specification. JEL Classification: E0, F01, F10, F15, F17

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    Paper provided by European Central Bank in its series Working Paper Series with number 1370.

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    Date of creation: Aug 2011
    Handle: RePEc:ecb:ecbwps:20111370
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    Keywords: financial crisis; forecasting; global trade downturn and recovery; Globalisation; import-intensity of components of total final expenditure; synchronisation; timevarying parameters; vertical specialisation;

    Find related papers by JEL classification:

    • E0 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General
    • F01 - International Economics - - General - - - Global Outlook
    • F10 - International Economics - - Trade - - - General
    • F15 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Economic Integration
    • F17 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Forecasting and Simulation

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    1. Amador, João & Cabral, Sónia, 2009. "Vertical specialization across the world: A relative measure," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 267-280, December.
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    10. Calista Cheung & Stéphanie Guichard, 2009. "Understanding the World Trade Collapse," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 729, OECD Publishing.
    11. Bricongne, Jean-Charles & Fontagné, Lionel & Gaulier, Guillaume & Taglioni, Daria & Vicard, Vincent, 2012. "Firms and the global crisis: French exports in the turmoil," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(1), pages 134-146.
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    Cited by:

    1. repec:ecr:col016:40117 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Styliani Christodoulopoulou & Oļegs Tkačevs, 2016. "Measuring the effectiveness of cost and price competitiveness in external rebalancing of euro area countries: What do alternative HCIs tell us?," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 43(3), pages 487-531, August.
    3. Jos Jansen & Ad Stokman, 2011. "International Business Cycle Comovement: Trade and Foreign Direct Investment," DNB Working Papers 319, Netherlands Central Bank, Research Department.
    4. Anderton, Robert & Aranki, Ted & Bonthuis, Boele & Jarvis, Valerie, 2014. "Disaggregating Okun's law: decomposing the impact of the expenditure components of GDP on euro area unemployment," Working Paper Series 1747, European Central Bank.
    5. -, 2016. "Horizons 2030: Equality at the centre of sustainable development. Summary," Documentos de posición del período de sesiones de la Comisión 40117, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL).

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