The U.S.-Chinese Trade War: An Event Study of Stock-Market Responses

Author(s):  
Peter H Egger ◽  
Jiaqing Zhu

Abstract At the beginning of 2018, President Trump started taking protective tariff measures against products from China in a sequence of events which started a “trade war” between the United States (U.S.) and China. As the value of trade flows affected on both sides rose to a significant amount, this episode will become an interesting research object in the future. A thorough analysis of many outcomes of interest is at this point in time – and even will be in the next few years – impossible due to a lack of data which will only become available at a later point. However, as is customary with historical preferential liberalizations in trade agreements and potentially the opposite of it through Brexit, it is possible to gauge consequences of this “trade war” or “trade dispute” when focusing on the stocks of listed companies around related tariff-change announcements or implementations by the U.S. and China in the relevant time span. This paper proposes such an analysis and finds, very much consistent with the rumors from business, that the associated protectionist tariffs appear to have done to a large extent the opposite of what was intended: they hurt domestic firms in targeted and also other, untargeted sectors of an acting country, and they affect third countries and territories which are not even party to the “trade war” or “dispute”.

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 166-188
Author(s):  
Bhanupong Nidhiprabha

With nearly a year of trade dispute between the United States and China, it has become apparent that the global economy will slow down, and this will have a direct impact on world trade. We adopt a vector autoregressive model to examine the impact of the U.S.–China trade war on the Thai economy. The results indicate that Thailand's output and exports to key markets are adversely affected by the escalating trade dispute. The slowdown in the Chinese economy will also put further downward pressure on world commodity prices, which in turn will reduce Thailand's exports.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 62
Author(s):  
Tristan Kempf ◽  
Vito Bobek ◽  
Tatjana Horvat

The following paper deals with the American Chinese trade war and its impacts on Taiwan’s economy, particularly sales in Taiwan’s semiconductor industry. Indeed, trade tensions impact global supply chains, especially in the semiconductor industry, since its supply chain is highly globalized and dependent on many companies in various countries. Hence, the industry is susceptible to trade disruptions. With the largest microchip manufacturer TSMC, Taiwan is one of the key players in the fabrication of microchips. It has strong cultural, geographical, and economic ties to China and, on the other hand, strong economic and military relations to the United States. A trade war between those two countries is an enormous future challenge for the island. However, this paper proves that trade tensions had a lower-than-expected impact on Taiwan’s economy and the microchip industry. Due to capital that diverted from China to Taiwan and investments from Taiwanese companies in other countries like the USA. Additionally, Taiwan handled the Covid-19 pandemic extraordinarily well and therefore did not have any significant economic restrictions in the domestic market. Now it depends on the future action steps of the Taiwanese industry and government. If Taiwan manages to steer outgoing companies from China to Taiwan, the island could emerge as the surprise winner of the trade dispute. For this purpose, the paper gives concrete recommendations on how to increase the attractiveness for FDI through tax benefits or infrastructure investments.


2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 61-81
Author(s):  
Wen-jen Hsieh

The ongoing U.S.-China trade war and ensuing high-tech conflicts are regarded as Taiwan's most crucial opportunity to slow down its progressively increasing economic dependence on China. The impact of the U.S.–China trade tensions on Taiwan are important to analyze because of Taiwan's relatively unique political and economic relationships with the United States and China, especially since the latter views Taiwan as its “breakaway province.” The regression results indicate that Taiwan's outward investment to China is significantly affected by Taiwan's lagged investment and exports to China, and the gap in the economic growth rates between Taiwan and China. Policy implications are provided for Taiwan to alleviate its economic dependency on the Chinese market and the negative impact from the U.S.-China trade war.


2019 ◽  
Vol 113 ◽  
pp. 383-387
Author(s):  
Julian Ku

I want to begin by spending a little time articulating how I understand the U.S. government's new “free and open Indo-Pacific” (FOIP) policy, which encompasses more than the trade agreements Inu discussed in her remarks. Then, I want to take a look at how this new U.S. strategy and approach would apply to one important key player in the region: Taiwan.


Author(s):  
Josh Ederington ◽  
Arik Levinson ◽  
Jenny Minier

Abstract U.S. Presidential Executive Order 13141 commits the United States to a careful assessment and consideration of the environmental impacts of trade agreements. The most direct mechanism through which trade liberalization would affect environmental quality in the U.S. is through the composition of industries. Freer trade means greater specialization, increasing the concentration of polluting industries in some countries and decreasing it in others. We begin by documenting the substantial shift in U.S. manufacturing toward cleaner industries from 1972 to 1994. We then use annual industry-level data on imports to the U.S. to examine whether this compositional shift can be traced to the significant trade liberalization that occurred over the same time period, and we conclude that no such connection exists. A shift toward cleaner industries has also occurred among U.S. imports, and we find no evidence that pollution-intensive industries have been disproportionately affected by the tariff changes.


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Nilay Yıldız ◽  

This article is written to summarize what has been going on in trade war between the United States and China and to express how this war affects trade relations of Latin America with both of the actors being involved in the trade war. The reason why Latin America is chosen as a region to work on rests on the fact that both the United States and China have been conducting considerable trade relations with the region. This article is organized to analyze what kind of a position Latin America would be at during the upcoming moves from two giants and how the region should revise its ties with both economies considering the past relations it has had with before this trade war emerged. There have been many moves taken by the United States and China after the dispute started to show up; however, Latin America has been conducting considerable relations in terms of trade, politics, historical orientation, and geographical ties with both giants since long before the trade dispute began. Therefore, this article has an aim to recover the historical trade relations of Latin America and to have some clues to determine what can come next for the region’s economic position and trade relations. Colonial past of the region, the role it has played during the Cold War, the involvement of the Latin America in trade relations with China, and Chinese presence in the region are the factors that are included in the article to understand the critical position of Latin America in the Sino–US trade war.


2021 ◽  
Vol 65 (11) ◽  
pp. 31-39
Author(s):  
Z. Podoba ◽  
V. Gorshkov

The paper addresses current issues in Japan-U.S. foreign trade following the signing of the Japan-U.S. Trade Agreement and the Japan-U.S. Agreement on Digital Trade in October 2019. By providing an overview of Japan-U.S. trade relations, analyzing current trends in bilateral foreign trade and outlining basic terms of new bilateral agreements, the authors conclude that “path-dependency” in Japan-U.S. contemporary foreign trade persists and trade relations between the two countries are to a greater extent influenced by the U.S. trade policy which aims to assure a broader access of American companies to Japanese markets – the situation that was typical for bilateral trade relations since the 1980s. “Path-dependency” in Japan-U.S. trade relations, conventionally categorized by the existence of numerous trade contradictions, is pronounced in the unchanged goals, strategy and tactics of foreign trade negotiations. The United States maintains its “attacking” role and dominates in the bilateral trade negotiations, while Japan, despite its enhancing influence in the multilateral trading system and regional trade agreements, is forced to “self-defend” and make concessions to a more dominant partner in order to maintain its automobile exports to the United States at the expense of its national interests in other industries, particularly in the agricultural sector. Thus, new trade agreements are unlikely to cause significant structural changes in Japan-U.S. bilateral trade in the shortterm as the problem of persistent trade deficits remains. In order to break the vicious circle of “path-dependency” Japan is to actively cooperate with the economies of the European Union which have large amounts of trade deficits with the U.S., can serve as a mediator in the U.S. – China trade conflicts, as well with other Asian countries via mega-FTAs which possess potential risks to the United States. Further development of foreign trade cooperation will depend on the initiatives of new governments in both countries.


Author(s):  
Fabiani A Duarte ◽  
Fabiani A Duarte

By providing over $24 billion in foreign assistance to 154 countries, the United States was the largest economic and humanitarian aid donor in the world in 2008 (Schaefer, 2006; Tarnoff & Lawson, 2009). By viewing the U.S. government through this lens, U.S. free trade agreements (FTA), like U.S. foreign aid, assist economically-weaker countries to develop while advancing specific U.S. foreign policy initiatives. By analyzing NAFTA’s effects on Mexico’s economic growth and the provisions of the signed U.S.-Colombian Free Trade Agreement, this paper demonstrates the inefficiencies and unintended consequences of multilateral and bilateral FTAs. The analysis concludes by suggesting an alternative approach to proactive and productive economic development: regional economic FTAs. Keywords: free trade agreement (FTA), tariff, economic development program, foreign direct investment (FDI), internally displaced persons (IDPs), bilateral FTA, multilateral FTA, regional FTA


2010 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 1850188 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Pelzman ◽  
Amir Shoham

The United States and the European Union have generated dozens of bilateral Regional Trading Agreements (RTA) across the globe. All of these trading arrangements have detailed agreements on rules of origin (ROOs). Those rules are required in order to ensure that the perceived benefits of the Free Trade Agreements (FTA) are not subverted or deflected. These rules have their greatest impact on a firm's cost structure when applied to the trade of intermediate goods. Determination of the origin of final goods becomes more complicated where imported intermediates are used and the WTO 'substantial transformation' rules are implemented. There is relatively little literature on the impact of these rules of origin on trade. (Cadot et al., 2006; Duttagupta and Panagariya, 2002; and Falvey and Reed, 1998, 2002). The existing literature hypothesizes that these rules can easily be used to restrict or suppress trade between countries, or to divert trade away from more efficient suppliers to less efficient ones. The empirical evidence to support the trade distortions is based on the number and complexity of the rules of origin. In order to determine the degree to which the post-RTA trade flows are indeed affected by ROO requires a micro-based review of increased transaction costs, rather than the number of rules. The intent of this paper is to suggest a formal methodology, which relies on the literature about tariff-equivalents, to evaluate rules of origin requirements. The suggested approach, applied at the 5-digit HS level will provide a more robust evaluation of ROOs. The suggested methodology could also be used to investigate the oft-asserted hypothesis that with time and reduced tariff barriers, the costs associated with ROOs will diminish.


2021 ◽  
Vol 01 (01) ◽  
pp. 2150001
Author(s):  
Yinhong Shi

Due to the serious perverse actions of the Trump administration in the fields of strategic rivalry, political/ideological confrontation, diplomatic exchanges and trade war between China and the United States as well as in that of global governance, Biden’s new administration is bound to make revisions somewhat and somehow. However, the current posture of the United States toward China is not only strong and enduring international structural dynamics in many aspects, but also multilateral strong and enduring domestic political and social ones. Therefore, its revision is to be necessarily quite partial and limited, and the confrontation and competition with China in some other areas will probably intensify. To a large extent, the trend of China–US relations after the US election could be influenced or even shaped by China, so China’s strategy and policy and appropriate adjustment are of great importance. China needs to take the initiative to avoid military conflicts with the United States, treating it as the essential highest common interest and the vital “common denominator” and to strive for a sort of pragmatic, focused and concrete dialogue or negotiation with the Biden administration as soon as possible after it took office.


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