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Public Export Credit Guarantees and Foreign Trade Structure: Evidence from Austria
Author(s) -
Egger Peter,
Url Thomas
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
world economy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.594
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1467-9701
pISSN - 0378-5920
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9701.2006.00790.x
Subject(s) - accounts receivable , export credit agency , trade credit , jurisdiction , payment , economics , business , international trade , international economics , cash , credit history , letter of credit , credit reference , monetary economics , financial system , credit risk , finance , credit enhancement , political science , law , commercial bank
Foreign trade is usually not based on cash transactions, but rather sales on credit are the rule. The resulting monitoring costs for lenders and the risk of default on accounts receivable are part of the costs associated with cross‐border goods transactions. Relative to domestic trade credit, cross‐border credit creates trade barriers due to differences in language, business practice, jurisdiction and payment enforceability between trading partners. Export credit insurance has long been a domain of public export credit agencies. Only since the early 1980s private insurance is gaining ground. Using disaggregated panel data for goods exports from Austria over the period 1996 to 2002, we show that public export credit guarantees have a less than proportional positive effect on international trade volume. They predominantly affect the country structure of foreign trade but leave the industry specialisation almost unchanged.