اثرات نامتقارن از توسعه ی مالی برروی تجارت جنون-جنوب وجنوب-شمال:شواهدپانل داده ازبازارهای درحال ظهور

Using bilateral trade data in total and technology-and-skill-intensive manufactured goods for 28 developing countries that account for 82% of all developing country manufactures exports between 1978 and 2005, this paper explores the effects of financial development on the pattern of specialization in South–South and South–North trade. The empirical results using dynamic panel regressions and comprehensive sensitivity tests suggest that financial development in the South has an economically and statistically significant positive effect on the share of total and technology-and-skill-intensive manufactures exports in GDP, and total exports in South–South trade. In contrast, no such significant or robust effect of financial development is found in South–North trade. Overall, the positive effect of financial development is found to be asymmetric favoring South–South significantly more than South–North trade. In addition, financial development is found to be increasing technology-and-skill-intensive manufactured goods exports significantly more than total manufactured or merchandise goods exports.

In recent years a growing body of research has pointed out the level of financial development as a source of comparative advantage in international trade (Kletzer & Bardhan, 1987, Demirguc-Kunt & Maksimovic, 1998, Rajan & Zingales, 1998, Beck, 2002, Beck, 2003 and Svaleryd & Vlachos, 2005). Accordingly, industries and sectors that are more dependent on external finance are shown to grow faster in countries with better developed financial systems. In particular, developing countries (the South) with low levels of financial development are found to have lower export shares and trade balances in industries (such as manufactures) that depend more on external finance. Given that industries with higher external finance needs also have larger scales, higher research and development (R&D), higher working capital and value added in production (Kletzer & Bardhan, 1987, Rajan & Zingales, 1998, Beck, 2002 and Braun & Larrain, 2004), these findings have significant implications for development and long term growth in the South. Nevertheless, previous studies on the relationship between financial development and export structure have not differentiated the direction of trade within and between developing and developed countries. In this respect, there is also limited research analyzing the potential effects of financial development on the choice of technology, especially with regard to high value-added manufacturing sectors in developing countries.

This paper analyzed the effects of financial development on the structure of trade from a South–South and South–North perspective. The empirical results from a 28 year panel with 28 developing countries provide partial support to the previous research on the relationship between financial development and the pattern of specialization in international trade. In particular, conditional on the direction of developing country exports, financial sector development appears to be a significant source of comparative advantage in total and high-skill manufactured goods. Furthermore, consistent with the predictions of previous studies, increasing financial development is found to have a stronger positive effect on exports of higher value added and external finance-dependent manufactured goods.