Based on an empirical gravity model of sectoral bilateral trade, we uncover three features of bilateral trade balances. First, the difficulty of gravity models in fitting the observed level of bilateral balances is likely due to the presence of unobservable bilateral trade costs. Second, the...

There is an ongoing debate in the literature on whether global trade flows have become disconnected from the large real effective exchange rate movements in the wake of the global financial crisis. The question has important policy implications for the role of exchange rates in supporting growth...

The strong US policy response to the 2008-09 financial crisis raised concerns about its impact (spillovers) on other countries, with great focus on the monetary stimulus but little attention to fiscal policy, despite their combined deployment. Using a sign-restricted structural VAR approach, we...

Monetary policy entails demand augmenting and demand diverting effects, with its impact on the trade balance-and spillovers to other countries-depending on the relative magnitude of these opposing effects. Using US data, and a sign-restricted structural VAR identification strategy, we...

After the decline in oil prices, many oil exporters face the need to improve their external balances. Special characteristics of oil exporters make the exchange rate an ineffective instrument for this purpose and give fiscal policy a sizeable role. These conclusions are supported by regression...

We use a general-equilibrium model to explain the rise in global trade and payments imbalances since the mid-1990s, and then to construct adjustment paths to a steady state. Assuming that the shocks giving rise to the imbalances do not suddenly reverse, simulated movements in the U.S. trade...

This paper develops and estimates a model of the trade balance of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Credit flows and the fiscal stance are found to play a significant role in determining the trade balance. On this basis the paper discusses the trade-offs between monetary and fiscal policy settings needed...

Trade flows data show that the composition and cyclical properties of imports are similar in developed economies and emerging markets (EM) but this is not the case for exports. Unlike developed economies, (i) EM export few or only a selective set of capital goods and (ii) capital good and...

China''s sectoral trade composition, product quality mix, and import content of processing exports have all changed substantially during the past decade. This has rendered trade elasticities estimated using aggregate data highly unstable, with more recent data pointing to significantly higher...