توسعه مالی و تجارت بین المللی: آیا یک پیوند وجود دارد؟

This paper explores a possible link between financial development and trade in manufactures. The theoretical model focuses on the role of financial intermediaries in facilitating large-scale, high-return projects and shows that economies with better-developed financial sectors have a comparative advantage in manufacturing industries. We provide evidence for this hypothesis, first proposed by Kletzer and Bardhan (Journal of Development Economics 1987;27:57–70), using a 30-year panel for 65 countries. Controlling for country-specific effects and possible reverse causality, we show that financial development exerts a large causal impact on the level of both exports and the trade balance of manufactured goods.

Among the macroeconomic variables that the empirical growth literature has identified as being highly correlated with growth performance across countries are the level of financial development and the degree of openness.1 There is also a large literature that studies the issue of causality and the channels through which both financial development and openness affect economic growth.2 This paper explores a possible link between financial development and the structure of the trade balance. Specifically, it analyzes theoretically a channel through which the economy-wide level of external finance determines the trade balance in manufactures. It then assesses the empirical validity of this theoretical model in a 30-year panel of 65 countries.

This paper explored the link between the level of financial development and the structure of international trade. A theoretical model with two sectors showed one possible causal link from the level of financial development to the structure of the trade balance. The sector with high scale economies profits more from a higher level of financial development than the other sector. Economies with a better-developed financial sector therefore have a comparative advantage in sectors with high scale economies and, all else equal, are net exporters of them.