Trade finance matters: evidence from the COVID-19 crisis
研究发现2020年3月主要贸易国出口大幅下降，但使用信用证等银行中介融资的贸易流更具韧性，表明不确定性时期贸易金融至关重要。
This study documents a substantial decline in the exports of major trading nations taking place in March 2020. Accounting for product-specific seasonality and annual trends, the data suggest a drop by 38 per cent in France, about a quarter in Turkey and Germany, and 12 per cent in the US, relative to their historical averages. Detailed export data from Turkey, disaggregated by financing terms, show another striking pattern. Flows using bank intermediation which eliminates or reduces the risk of non-payment or non-arrival of prepaid goods, such as letters of credit or documentary collection, appear to have been much more resilient to the current downturn relative to flows using other financing terms. These findings suggest that access to trade finance is vital during times of heightened uncertainty.