Towards a Theory of Trade Finance

Shipping goods internationally is risky and takes time. To allocate risk and to finance the time gap between production and sale, a range of payment contracts is utilized. I study the optimal choice between these payment contracts considering one shot transactions, repeated transactions and implications for trade. The equilibrium contract is determined by financial market characteristics and contracting environments in both the source and the destination country. Trade increases in enforcement probabilities and decreases in financing costs proportional to the time needed for trade. Empirical results from gravity regressions are in line with the model, highly significant and economically relevant.trade finance, payment contracts, trade patterns, distance interaction

Bank Bail-Outs, International Linkages and Cooperation

Financial institutions are increasingly linked internationally and engaged in cross-border operations. As a result, financial crises and potential bail-outs by governments have important international implications. Extending Allen and Gale (2000) we provide a model of international contagion allowing for bank bail-outs financed by distortionary taxes. In the sequential game between governments, there are inefficiencies due to spillovers, free-riding and limited burden-sharing. When countries are of equal size, an increase in cross-border deposit holdings improves, in general, the non-cooperative outcome. For efficient crisis managment, ex-ante fiscal burden sharing is essential as ex-post contracts between governments do not achieve the same global welfare.bail-out, contagion, financial crisis, international institutional arrangements

Bank Bailouts, International Linkages and Cooperation

Financial institutions are increasingly linked internationally. As a result, financial crisis and government intervention have stronger effects beyond borders. We provide a model of international contagion allowing for bank bailouts. While a social planner trades off tax distortions, liquidation losses and intra- and intercountry income inequality, in the noncooperative game between governments there are inefficiencies due to externalities, no burden sharing and free-riding. We show that, in absence of cooperation, stronger interbank linkages make government interests diverge, whereas cross-border asset holdings tend to align them. We analyze different forms of cooperation and their effects on global and national welfare.Portfolio choice, international transmission of shocks, monetary policy

Towards a Theory of Trade Finance

Shipping goods internationally is risky and takes time. Therefore, trading partners not only have to agree on the specification and the price of a good, but also on the timing of payments. To allocate risk and to finance the time gap between production and sale, a range of different payment contracts is utilized, broadly classified into exporter finance (Open Account), importer finance (Cash in Advance) and bank finance (Letter of Credit). I study the optimal choice between these three types of payment contracts considering one shot transactions, repeated transactions and implications for trade. The equilibrium contract is determined by financial market characteristics and contracting environments in both the source and the destination country. Trade increases in enforcement probabilities and decreases in financing costs. The latter effect is the larger, the longer the time needed for trade. I use a panel of bilateral trade flows to test these predictions, running gravity regressions that include interaction terms between distance and financing costs. Results are in line with the model, highly significant and economically relevant

Payment choice in international trade: theory and evidence from cross-country firm-level data

When trading across borders, firms choose between different payment contracts. Theoretically, this should allow firms to trade-off differences in financing costs and enforcement across countries. This paper provides evidence for this hypothesis employing firm-level data from a large number of developing countries. As predicted, international transactions are more likely paid after delivery when financing costs in the source country are high and when contract enforcement is low. We extend the theory and also show empirically that the more complex an industry is, the more important is contract enforcement and the less important are financing costs for the contract choice