The micro evolution of trade and turnover in Turkey under the global crisis

We provide evidence on the effects of the recent financial and economic crisis on the Turkish manufacturing. We first decompose aggregate sales, exports and imports, dissecting the contribution of the extensive and intensive margins at the firmand firm-product level. Secondly, we investigate the determinants of both margins, inspecting the role of firm and product heterogeneity in the onset of the crisis, andwe support the demand shock explanation of the crisis. Our findings point at the prevalence of the intensive margin in the negative 2009 evolution of overall and exported sales. On the contrary, the drop in imports, which represents the most dramatic one, is importantly driven by the net exit of large and exporting firms and by the net dropping of products. More productive firms lead the slump in export sales and, among the products, capital and intermediate goods experience the sharpest demand decline. Also, importing favours exporting especially during the crisis. Finally, a stronger resilience emerges for exporters of own products compared to carry-along-trade exporters.