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There are three main chapters in the dissertation which fall in the areas of industrial organization and international economics. After the introduction and the literature review, I present two different models that highlight how the degree of substitutability between differentiated products on a market affects a new entrant's entry decisions. I further extend the benchmark model to discuss the implications of the government trade policy on the competition strategies. The last chapter investigates how the bilateral trade flows in various industries between the United States and China respond to Yuan/Dollar exchange rate fluctuations and a few other key variables. In the second chapter, I extend the Singh and Vivies (1984) model and the Hackner (2000) model by allowing for a multi-product duopoly, a domestic incumbent and a foreign entrant, with asymmetric costs in producing two differentiated products: high- and low-quality. If they engage in Cournot competition, in the subgame perfect Nash equilibrium, the foreign entrant will choose to supply both products when two varieties are more heterogeneous. If two varieties are more homogeneous, the foreign entrant tends to supply only one product. After extending the model to consider the tariff imposed on foreign imports, the simulation results suggest that, to increase domestic welfare, the government should allow cost-effective foreign entrants to enter, but keep cost-ineffective ones out of the domestic market. In the third chapter, I provide a thorough analysis of the Bertrand model with a setup that is similar to the Cournot model. When firms compete on prices, the SPNE differs significantly from that of the Cournot model. Depending on the relative marginal cost between two firms, there are circumstances under which the foreign entrant would choose to only enter into the low- or the high-quality market regardless of the degree of substitutability between two varieties. Furthermore, when the domestic government imposes a tariff on the foreign imports, the foreign entrant's entry decision changes with the tariff level. In the last chapter, unlike the existing literature which mainly look at the relationship between the exchange rate and the trade balance at the aggregate level, I attempt to investigate the short-run and the long-run impact of the Yuan/Dollar exchange rate on the US trade balance at the commodity level using a new methodology, the Autoregressive Distributed Lag Bounds Testing approach. As most articles found no short-run and long-run relationship between the exchange rate and the trade balance at the aggregate level ("aggregation bias"), I argue that different commodities may respond to the exchange rate fluctuations differently. Therefore, this study would offer us a better understanding on which US industries are more vulnerable to the Yuan/Dollar exchange rate fluctuations and which ones are strong players against Chinese competitors. In addition, I further explore other possible contributors to the US trade deficit such as income levels, China FDI inflow, and the US FDI outflow. / Economics

This research investigates the impact of disruptions and regional integration on agricultural and food trade, relying on a unique international and intranational (domestic) agri-food trade dataset and structural gravity. In the first chapter, we investigate the impact of animal diseases on trade of animal-based products. We found that animal disease outbreaks decrease exports by 4% on average per year, amounting to annualized losses of 96 billion of 2019 USD. Trade quantities decline by 8% (51 million tons) on average per year. Impacts are mostly concentrated on consumer products (mainly pork), and low-income and lower-medium-income exporting countries. Our results suggest that animal diseases affect more domestic markets than foreign ones, and that dependent importers are the most sensitive to animal disease outbreaks abroad. Lastly, participation in the same RTA is found to mitigate animal diseases' trade impact, showing another potential channel through which regional integration could affect members' trade. In the second chapter, we explore the effect of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) on agricultural and food trade flows. We consider the entire official lifetime of the agreement, including its 14-years phase-in period, which allow us to offer a comprehensive evaluation of one of the biggest trade agreements on agri-food trade. NAFTA is found to increase members' trade on average by 54%, corresponding to 11.9 billion of 2020 USD, annually. Trade involving Mexico, and especially Canada-Mexico, has increased substantially showing that trade agreements between developed and developing countries could be beneficial to both members. NAFTA's impact is found to be heterogeneous by products with cereals experiencing the biggest increase. Trade of products incompletely liberalized by NAFTA such as dairy, poultry, and eggs, did not increase as much as the trade of liberalized products. We do not find evidence of trade diversion, suggesting that NAFTA's agri-food trade gains did not come at the expense of trading with other partners. Lastly, NAFTA appears to be more trade enhancing (about four times more) than other agreements of Canada, Mexico and the U.S. (e.g. Canada-E.U., or Mexico-Brazil, or U.S.-Korea.) In the third chapter, we question whether trade agreements alleviate the impact of shocks on trade. More specifically, we investigate if RTAs mitigate the impact of exchange rate (ER) volatility on agri-food trade. We found that RTAs amplify the effect of ER volatility on agri-food trade. The trade impact of ER volatility on RTA members is found to be positive, suggesting that members' agri-food trade benefits from ER volatility, contrary to non-members' trade. This could result from larger profits from arbitrage due to reduced trade costs between RTA members. Our results display a strong heterogeneity according to sectors, exporters and importers' income, and level of integration of RTA. Only Partial Scope Agreements, the lowest regional integration level, amplify the effect of ER volatility on members' agri-food trade. / Doctor of Philosophy / This research evaluates the impact of factors that cause trade disruption and the impact of trade agreements on agricultural and food trade. In the first chapter, we investigate the impact of animal diseases on trade of animal-related products. Findings indicate that animal diseases decrease the value of trade on average 4% annually, amounting to 96 billion of 2019 USD annualized loss. Trade quantities are reduced by 8%, or 51 million tons yearly on average. This impact differs with respect to animal diseases, products, and income levels of countries. Animal diseases affect more the domestic market, while countries depending to foreign suppliers are those affected the most by animal disease outbreaks abroad. Regional trade agreements (RTAs) mitigate the impact of animal diseases, showing that trade integration could benefit their members beyond the lowering their tariffs. In the second chapter, we evaluate the impact of the North American Free Trade Agreement on agri-food trade. We found that NAFTA increased members' trade by 54%, amounting to 11.9 billion of 2020 USD annually on average. NAFTA's trade gains were distributed heterogeneously across members, with trade between Canada and Mexico recording the largest proportional gains. Cereals recorded substantial gains during NAFTA, while the trade of beef and vegetables also increased. The trade though of some products that did not become completely tariff-free by members, such as eggs, dairy, and poultry, underperformed. Lastly, NAFTA increased Canada, Mexico, and U.S. trade about 4.5 times more than the other agreements signed by the three countries. In the third chapter, we investigate whether RTAs mitigate the impact of exchange rate (ER) volatility on agri-food trade. The results suggest that RTAs amplify the impact of ER volatility, however, this is in favor of RTA members, since the impact of ER volatility on their trade is positive. The results are heterogeneous across sectors, incomes of exporters and importers, and extent of liberalization by RTAs. Partial Scope Agreements, the lowest level of trade liberalizing agreements, are the only type of RTAs that amplify (or affect in general) the effect of ER volatility on members' agri-food trade.

Yes / This paper develops a model of optimal choice over an array of different assets, including domestic and foreign bonds, domestic and foreign equities and domestic and foreign real money balances in order to examine the determination of the real exchange rate in the long-run. The model is tested empirically using data from the UK and the USA. The results show that all the coefficients of the model are right signed and significant and consequently financial assets may play a significant role in the determination of the real exchange rate.

Yes / This paper examines real effective exchange rate (REER) responses to shocks in exchange rate determinants for the West African Monetary Zone (WAMZ) over the period 1980–2015. The analysis is based on a country-by-country VECM, and oil price, supply and demand shocks are identified using long run restrictions in a structural VAR model. We report significant differences in the response of REER to real oil price, productivity (supply) and demand preference shocks across these economies. In addition the relative contribution of these shocks to REER movements in the short and long run appears to be different across economies. Our findings suggest that the WAMZ countries are structurally different, and asymmetric shocks with inadequate adjustment mechanisms imply that a monetary union would be costly.

The primary objective of this dissertation is to extend the classical Principal Components Analysis (PCA), aiming to reduce the dimensionality of a large number of Normal interrelated variables, in two directions. The first is to go beyond the static (contemporaneous or synchronous) covariance matrix among these interrelated variables to include certain forms of temporal (over time) dependence. The second direction takes the form of extending the PCA model beyond the Normal multivariate distribution to the Elliptically Symmetric family of distributions, which includes the Normal, the Student's t, the Laplace and the Pearson type II distributions as special cases. The result of these extensions is called the Generalized principal component analysis (GPCA). The GPCA is illustrated using both Monte Carlo simulations as well as an empirical study, in an attempt to demonstrate the enhanced reliability of these more general factor models in the context of out-of-sample forecasting. The empirical study examines the predictive capacity of the GPCA method in the context of Exchange Rate Forecasting, showing how the GPCA method dominates forecasts based on existing standard methods, including the random walk models, with or without including macroeconomic fundamentals. / Ph. D. / Factor models are employed to capture the hidden factors behind the movement among a set of variables. It uses the variation and co-variation between these variables to construct a fewer latent variables that can explain the variation in the data in hand. The principal component analysis (PCA) is the most popular among these factor models. I have developed new Factor models that are employed to reduce the dimensionality of a large set of data by extracting a small number of independent/latent factors which represent a large proportion of the variability in the particular data set. These factor models, called the generalized principal component analysis (GPCA), are extensions of the classical principal component analysis (PCA), which can account for both contemporaneous and temporal dependence based on non-Gaussian multivariate distributions. Using Monte Carlo simulations along with an empirical study, I demonstrate the enhanced reliability of my methodology in the context of out-of-sample forecasting. In the empirical study, I examine the predictability power of the GPCA method in the context of “Exchange Rate Forecasting”. I find that the GPCA method dominates forecasts based on existing standard methods as well as random walk models, with or without including macroeconomic fundamentals.

本文研究目的有四：(1) 研究以本國通貨貶值率為政策工具的影響效果與相關的議題。(2) 探討由固定匯率到爬行釘住匯率再到浮動匯率崩潰的過程，並且分析有何關鍵因素，會影響匯率制度崩潰時間。(3) 討論匯率定錨政策失敗的原因，並提出以往文獻可能忽略的因素。(4) 分析通貨替代性是否會影響匯率政策的效果，甚至使匯率政策遭遇困難而失敗。為了達成研究目的，本文內容共分五章，除了第一章的緒論和第五章的總結外，其餘各章的內容為： 第二章延伸Calvo (1981) 的架構，加入Chen, Tsaur and Chou (1981)、曹添旺 (1987) 及張文雅、賴景昌和曹添旺 (1991) 的觀點，並仿照Liviatan (1891)、Engel (1989)、Calvo (1985) 的作法，設立一個具有通貨替代環境的小型開放經濟模型，探討本國通貨貶值率上升對經濟體系的影響。文中發現通貨之間若有較高 (較低) Edgeworth 替代關係，則本國通貨貶值率上升，經常帳會因此改善 (惡化)。本章亦針對通貨替代程度的不同，分析提升本國通貨貶值率政策對社會福利的影響效果，其中發現：不論是通貨替代程度大小，提升本國通貨貶值率政策對社會福利的影響均有兩種不同的情況，其中的一種是確定福利下降，另一種是不確定。 第三章仍然依據Chen, Tsaur and Chou (1981)、曹添旺 (1987) 及張文雅、賴景昌和曹添旺 (1991) 所強調通貨能提供流動性勞務，降低交易成本的功能，將本國通貨和外國通貨放入模型內，建立一個以交易功能為基礎的貨幣模型，探討由固定匯率崩潰到爬行釘住匯率，再由爬行釘住匯率崩潰到浮動匯率的過程，有何關鍵因素，會影響匯率制度崩潰時間。結果發現：(1) 不論是通貨替代、通貨互補或是通貨獨立的環境下，實際發生匯率制度崩潰的時間早於自然崩潰的時間。(2) 制度崩潰的時點由通貨替代或是通貨互補的程度決定，通貨替代性越是極端 (例如：完全互補或完全替代) 將使通貨危機越早發生，而通貨替代關係越低將使通貨危機發生時間延後。(3) 當固定匯率轉換到爬行釘住匯率時，所產生的外匯存底流失的額度將會是決定爬行釘住匯率制度是否能夠執行的關鍵。 第四章以代表性個人最適化模型的架構，加入Végh (1995) 主張外國通貨能提供流動性勞務，降低交易成本的觀點，建立一個具有通貨替代環境的交易成本貨幣成長模型，分析名目匯率定錨政策崩潰的過程與通貨替代程度的關連性，結果發現匯率定錨政策失敗的主因可能是名目匯率定錨政策違反經常帳跨期平衡所致。為了避免通貨危機提早發生，匯率政策須視通貨替代程度的高低作適當的調整。通貨替代程度較高時，貨幣當局應當在政策執行時，大幅的降低本國通貨貶值率，可使政策崩潰的時間延後；而通貨替代程度較低時，貨幣當局應當採用小幅度降低本國通貨貶值率，可拖延政策崩潰發生的時間。 / This paper has four purposes: (1) Research in the influence and relevant topics about adopting depreciation rate of the domestic currency as policy instrument. (2) Show the dynamics transition process from the fixed, to the crawling peg, and then to the flexible exchange rate regimes, and analyze the central factor about time of collapse of exchange rate regimes. (3) Research in the reason about the exchange-rate-based stabilization program fails, and it may be ignored by the existing literature. (4) Analyze the influence of the currency substitutability affects the effect of exchange rate policy, even to cause difficulty and failure. In order to achieve the research purposes, the content of this paper divides into five chapters, except that chapter 1 is the introduction and chapter 5 is conclusion; the rest is organized as follows: In chapter 2, this paper expands Calvo (1981) model, combining the spirit of Chen, Tsaur and Chou (1981), Tsaur (1987), Chang, Lai and Tsaur (1991) and the approach of Liviatan (1891), Engel (1989), Calvo (1985), we set up the framework for small open economy with currency substitution environments to explore the policy effects of a rise in the rate of devaluation domestic currency on economy. We find that if two currencies are higher (lower) degree of Edgeworth substitution, then a rise in the rate of devaluation domestic currency induced a current account surplus (deficit) on the transition path. This chapter also aims at the currency substitution degree the difference, the analysis about a rise in the rate of devaluation domestic currency to the social welfare influence effect. We show that no matter is the currency substitution degree size, a rise in the rate of devaluation domestic currency to have two kind of different situations to the social welfare influence, one is the definite welfare drops; another is an ambiguous. In chapters 3, we investigate the relationship between the collapse timing of exchange rate regime and degree of substitutability of foreign currency for domestic currency as a medium of exchange. According to the spirit of Chen, Tsaur and Chou (1981), Tsaur (1987), Chang, Lai and Tsaur (1991), we set up a transaction-based monetary model in which money provides liquidity services to reduce transaction costs, domestic and foreign currencies are introduced into the system. The results of study show (1) no matter what degree of substitutability of foreign currency for domestic currency, the collapse timing of the exchange rate regime is earlier than the natural collapse timing, and (2) the collapse timing depends on the degree of currency substitution or complement. We find that the extreme degree of substitutability of currencies led to earlier currency crisis; however, moderate degree of substitutability of currencies prolong currency crisis. We also explore the dynamic transition process from the fixed to the crawling peg, and then to the flexible exchange rate regimes. We find that the extent of the decrease in foreign exchange reserves is the key whether the fixed exchange rate is able to transform into the crawling peg exchange rate regime. In chapter 4, we investigate the relationship between the failures of exchange-rate-based stabilization program and degree of foreign currency substitutability. According to Végh (1995), we set up a transaction-based monetary model with currency substitution in which foreign currencies provides liquidity services to reduce transaction costs. The reason of failure on exchange-rate-based stabilization program is that it violates intertemporal current account balance constraint. In order to prolong the time of the currency crisis occurs, the exchange-rate-based stabilization program must regard the degree of currency substitution. When the degree of currency substitution is high, the monetary authority must reduce the rate of devaluation domestic currency largely, and when the degree of currency substitution is low, the monetary authority must narrow scale to reduce the rate of devaluation domestic currency, and prolong time of policy collapse occurrence.

本文目的在於探討匯率不確定性對台灣出口波動之影響。本文應用Barkoulas et al.(2002)理論架構，利用台灣1989年至2007年的月資料。實證結果發現：美元、日圓兌新台幣的匯率波動對於台灣出口美、日兩國的數量並無明顯的影響。美元兌新台幣的匯率波動對於以美國為進口國的台灣出口波動則有正向的影響；日圓兌新台幣的匯率波動對於以日本為進口國的台灣出口波動卻沒有顯著影響。本文認為：造成美元匯率波動主要支配力量，來自於貨幣政策制定者掌握之資訊優勢差異；造成日圓匯率波動的來源則無主要支配力量的存在。造成此種結果的原因在於貨幣政策制定者長久以來所建立的政策可信度所致，削減了造成美元匯率波動的另外二股力量。因此，新台幣兌換美元匯率波動取決於貨幣政策制定者掌握經濟真實狀況的能力與其貨幣政策方向。 / This paper investigates into the effect of exchange rate uncertainty on Taiwan export volatility. Under the theoretical framework of Barkoulas et al.(2002) and the empirical monthly data of Taiwan exports from 1989 to 2007, it is summarized that the exchange rate volatility of NTD/USD and NTD/JPY had no effect on the Taiwan exporting volume toward U.S. or Japan. However, the exchange rate volatility of NTD/USD did have positive effect on the export volatility of Taiwan to U.S. while that of NTD/JPY had no significant effect on the export volatility of Taiwan to Japan.It is argued that the dominant source of NTD/USD exchange rate volatility resulted from the variance of monetary authorities’ information advantage. On the other hand, it exists no such a dominant source in NTD/JPY exchange rate volatility.