The "Great Trade Collapse" triggered by the 2008-09 crisis calls for a careful assessment of the trade losses from financial crises. We adopt a more detailed perspective by looking at the response of different types of trade (i.e. agricultural, mining, and manufactured goods, and services)...

The cost of the financial crisis to the real economy has so far remained underexamined,probably because of the difficulty in making such an assessment. The crisis was precipitatedby an unsustainable bubble that artificially inflated economic fi ures, so what should be used as a benchmark for...