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The article focuses on the role of transportation “hubs" in the pattern of interregional and perhaps international trade. It is also found that free trade agreements do not promote export in East Asia, only export in intermediate goods. The paper presents analyzes the rise of global value chains (GVCs) in East Asia, export is increasingly sensitive to the capital-labor ratio and high-skilled labor productivity and understanding the twin-hub trade regime between China and Japan.

This paper analyzes how the current Global Value Chain (GVC) of East Asia has been established, and attempts to project the future trajectory of GVC under New Normal in the global trading system. For this purpose, the framework of Ideology-Technology- Institution nexus is presented with focus on the dynamics of interplay between ideology and technology, duly recognizing the dual-aspect of technology- a platform for business and also for national defense. The paper analyzes how the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) of the 1990s played a role of "facilitator" in shaping the GVC of East Asia, where China plays 'factory for final assembly' and the US plays 'the largest consumer'. Under New Normal, digital technology is likely to play the opposite role of "disrupting" the GVC of East Asia, unlike ICT. The paper explores the mechanism behind this great disruption. What is driving New Normal is the US-China power competition, seeking for dominance in East Asia and beyond. This paper argues that New Normal is not temporary shock, but will last for some time. Under this presumption, the paper presents three scenarios for the future trajectory of GVC in East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars generally agree that regionalization and regionalism are different phenomena; however, unresolved arguments remain as to whether there is a causal relationship between the two. In particular, whether or not regionalization promotes regionalism is a subject of debate. This paper aims to comprehensively clarify and explain the relationship between regionalization as embodied in trade and foreign direct investment (FDI) and regionalism as characterized by preferential trade agreements (PTAs) using event history analyses of East Asian economic data from 1985 to 2018. The paper concludes that although a positive and significant relationship exists between FDI and some types of PTAs, trade has no relationship with the latter. This conclusion challenges extant literature, which has argued that an increase in PTAs in East Asia (the outcome of regionalism) is the consequence of economic interdependence (regionalization). Moreover, these findings indicate that political factors such as territorial disputes and joint democracy negatively affect certain types of PTAs. This result is contrary to the conventional wisdom that predicts increased cooperation and lower tariffs between democracies and therefore suggests further investigations of the determinants of PTAs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examine potential slowdown growth in international production networks in East Asia. Topics discussed include comprehensive analysis of trade patterns using data disaggregation; decline in trade in primary goods and sluggish growth of trade in chemicals and resource based producers as the cause of slow growth of international trade; and incorporation of the price-lowering effect of global production sharing in the analysis of balance of trade.

This paper investigates the effects of trade regionalism in East Asia from 1995 to 2018, by applying a series of gravity models. An initial, basic gravity model is repeatedly augmented to account for a range of economic, geographical, cultural, and above all institutional factors representing free trade agreements in effect. Unlike previous studies, this investigation distinguishes between the bilateral and multilateral measures of regional trading arrangements. Two interesting findings are reported. First, the results confirm the impact of trade regionalism on the export flows between the economies of East Asia in the period under study. Second, the effects of multilateral trading agreements vary greatly depending on the agreement and on the particular country's range of influence, in particular cases showing no sufficient economic benefits. Overall, the results point to the complementarity of bilateral and multilateral trading arrangements in the region and to the emergence of a certain distinctive model of cooperation and integration in East Asia – which has been underpinned during the COVID-19 pandemic by the conclusion of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), and which will be further verified in the post-COVID character of global trade and regional trading arrangements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines what contributes to the trade growth of intermediate machinery goods in East Asia in the 1990s. To this end, this paper regresses the input allocation equation to obtain the estimator of border barriers in each country, and then, by using the estimators, the first difference logarithmic form of the gravity equation is regressed. Our empirical results suggest that reduction in border barriers and the production and expenditure growth of intermediate goods are important factors which contribute to the rapid growth of trade in machinery parts in East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is notable that the trade in East Asian countries has increased more than proportionately to the growth of economy. This paper tests the hypothesis that the recent trade expansion is induced by development of international fragmentation of production. This paper constructs an index of vertical intra-industry trade (VIIT) to measure the fragmentation of production, and finds that the share of VIIT has been rising in East Asia as well as in NAFTA and the EU using the gravity equation. It also establishes that a rising share of VIIT is an important factor in explaining the recent expansion of trade with East Asia. The results suggest that an agreement to remove and harmonize institutional impediments among East Asian countries is important for further expansion of trade within the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Glazed tiles were prestigious building materials reserved for embellishing the roofs of royal architectures of ancient states in East Asia. This paper, by studying glazed tiles from the palace precincts of Shangjingcheng, Xigucheng, and Baliancheng, three capital cities of the Bohai state (698–926 ad), aims to expose the vibrant technological and economic interactions among ancient states of East Asia untold in historical chronicles. Although it is well recorded that Bohai maintained intimate political, cultural, and commercial engagements with the Tang empire and the Yamato state, it is obscure what kinds of technology and commodities were involved in these activities. It appears that the bodies of these tiles were produced of local iron‐rich clays, and the glazes were made of compounds of the same clays and lead materials. The glazing technique may have been transmitted from the Tang empire yet modified in response to local circumstances. Lead materials were acquired from various sources, partly from the one for the Huangye sancai wares in the Tang empire, and partly from the one for Nara sancai wares of the Yamato state in Japan. Archaeology is therefore capable of enriching our knowledge of the human past, even in the historical period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

East Asia's Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) came into force in 2022 as the world's largest free trade agreement. RCEP was concluded, signed and brought into force in the face of major international uncertainty and is a significant boost to the global trading system. RCEP brings Australia, China, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand into the same agreement with the ten member ASEAN group at its centre. It keeps markets open and updates trade and investment rules in East Asia, a major centre of global economic activity, at a time of rising protectionism when the WTO itself is under threat. The agreement builds on ASEAN's free trade agreements and strengthens ASEAN centrality. One of the pillars of RCEP is an economic cooperation agenda which has its antecedents in ASEAN's approach to bringing along its least developed members and builds on the experience of capacity building in APEC and technical cooperation under the ASEAN Australia-New Zealand Free Trade Agreement. There is an opportunity to create a framework that facilitates deeper economic cooperation that involves experience-sharing, extending RCEP's rules and membership at the same time as strengthening political cooperation. The paper suggests some areas that might be best suited to cooperation -- that is confidence and trust building instead of or before negotiation -- and discusses how non-members may be engaged and the membership expanded. Options such as multilateralising provisions and becoming a platform for policy convergence and coordinating unilateral reforms are canvassed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines regional market integration through production networks and free trade agreements in East Asia and their attendant challenges and issues. It examines progress in the ASEAN Economic Community and in various ASEAN+1 free trade and economic integration agreements. It argues that there is a strong case for a region-wide agreement to maximize economic synergy and resolve emerging problems, including market fragmentation and the "noodle bowl" effect. It explores three possible paths to region-wide integration, namely, the East Asia Free Trade Area (encompassing ASEAN+3 [the People's Republic of China, Japan, and Korea]), the Comprehensive Economic Partnership for East Asia (encompassing ASEAN+3 countries and Australia--New Zealand and India) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, currently involving nine negotiating countries in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation. The paper explores the economic and political benefits and challenges of forming these three regionwide agreements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A salient feature of the East Asian region is the persistent discrepancy between the progress in de facto and de jure economic integration. East Asia has long been said to be the champion of loose regional economic integration, with deepening intra-regional trade and investment linkages in the absence of any formal cooperative scheme. However, an oft-heard claim is that East Asia has been shifting recently towards an institution-based form of regional economic cooperation, primarily as a result of the 1997–98 financial crisis. Next to post-crisis financial cooperative schemes under the ASEAN+3, the surge of Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs) involving East Asian countries is thought by some to further substantiate this claim. The objective of the paper is twofold; first, to assess the validity of the aforementioned claim; and second, to examine the links between de facto and de jure economic integration in East Asia compared to other regions of the world. In the process, the sequencing between trade and monetary cooperation is also addressed. The paper starts by providing a candid assessment of the current state of play of economic cooperation in East Asia (de jure integration), both from the trade and the financial/monetary perspective, and highlights the limitations of the formal regional integration movement in East Asia to date. As a next step, it explores the changing nature of intra-regional trade and investment linkages, contrasts it to the situation in other parts of the world such as Europe and examines to what extent this new form of interdependence may be instrumental in making formal regional economic schemes more attractive. A major conclusion is that de facto trade integration may not automatically lead to deeper regional trade cooperation de jure and that its impact is likely to be stronger on monetary cooperation projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Yeung H. W.-C. Regional development and the competitive dynamics of global production networks: an East Asian perspective, Regional Studies. The debate on the nature and dynamics of regional development in both academic and policy circles has now moved on from the earlier focus on endogenous regional assets to analysing the complex relationship between globalization and regional change. This position paper attempts to engage with this debate through the experience of regional development in East Asia. The paper shows that regional development cannot be understood independently of the changing dynamics of global production networks. While the existing literature on East Asia tends to focus on the state as the key driver of economic development at the national and regional levels, it is argued that the developmental state is a necessary but not sufficient condition for regional development to take place. Instead, one needs to study the complex strategic coupling of those economic actors, particularly large business firms, operating in specific regions in Asia with their lead firm counterparts orchestrating production networks on a global basis... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author comments on a study on whether intra-regional trade and financial integration among countries in East Asia has contributed to the de-coupling of business cycles of individual countries in the region from the rest of the world. The author offers an overview of the study. The author finds the discussion on trade integration somewhat unbalanced and out of line with the emerging patterns of trade in the region. The author cites two reasons which can lead to misleading inferences as to the nature and extent of trade integration among countries.

Japanese shares of export and manufacturing value-added in the global market have declined significantly, whereas those in China have risen sharply. This paper examines how recent increases in offshoring by Japanese firms relates to the changes in the composition of export, the structure of national production, and the international distribution of manufacturing value-added in Japan, China, East Asian countries, the United States, and European countries, on the basis of our original survey of Japanese firm's offshoring and the statistics of export and manufacturing production of these countries. It also discusses how the net cost saving of offshoring due to wage differentials and institutional factors will affect the sustainability of Japanese offshoring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The spread of free trade agreements (FTAs) in East Asia amidst slow progress in the WTO Doha negotiations has stimulated a debate over the way forward. This paper examines the region's evolving trade architecture, characteristics of FTAs and welfare implications of alternative FTA scenarios. It suggests that consolidation of multiple and overlapping FTAs into a single East Asian FTA can help mitigate the harmful noodle bowl effects of different tariffs, rules of origin and standards. The paper also suggests that WTO-plus elements need to be further expanded and that consolidation into a Comprehensive Economic Partnership in East Asia at the ASEAN+6 level would yield the largest gains to East Asia among plausible regional trade agreements. As the next priority, the paper points to the formation of FTAs between East Asia, the United States and the EU as well as making FTAs more multilateral-friendly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates how intra-industry trade (IIT) is linked to cross-country income difference and foreign direct investment (FDI). We distinguish IIT as either horizontally or vertically differentiated, using bilateral exports and imports data for Japan and the remaining East Asian countries at the SITC five-digit level over 1990-2000. Our results show that the income difference has a negative relationship with the share of horizontal IIT, but a positive relationship with vertical IIT, and that cross-country FDI has a positive relationship with share of horizontal IIT and a negative relationship with share of vertical IIT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to identify the appropriate form of a regional trading agreement in East Asia by estimating the intra-regional trade bias of various informal regional groups. The major conclusion is that ASEAN+3 would be the natural policy choice for the formation of a regional trading agreement in East Asia. Moreover, ASEAN+3 will not diverge from the principles of open regionalism and multilateralism, when we consider its inherently open character and the positive influence of the United States and Japan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As trade integration deepens in East Asia, closer links among the business cycles of East Asian countries can be expected. Theoretically, however, increased trade could lead to either closer or looser business cycles across trading partners. This paper seeks to understand how the business cycles of 12 Asian economies have been influenced by increased trade among them. It finds that the increasing trade itself is not necessarily associated with an increased synchronization of their business cycles. Intra-industry trade, rather than inter-industry trade or the volume of trade itself, is the major channel through which their business cycles become synchronized. This result has important implications for the prospects for a unified currency in the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author presents his comments on Mitsuyo Ando and Fukunar Kimura's findings about the expanding linkage of production in North America with East Asia especially in the electric machinery sector. Topics discussed include their claim that foreign direct investment strengthened the linkage of production networks in North America and East Asia and their use of gravity models to confirm the strengthening of inter-regional production network which the author deems lacking in control variables.

This paper investigates new developments in the pattern of machinery trade, with a focus on the extent and depth of production networks in North America. We pay particular attention to North America's trade links with East Asia, which have intensified in the last two decades. Investigation of changes in total trade value and the growth of trade on the extensive margin both demonstrates the expanding fragmentation of production in North America as well as the strengthening of connections with Mexico. Our quantitative analysis, which is based on gravity estimation of trade volume and extensive margin trade responses, also provides evidence that U.S. imports of machinery from East Asia are especially strong, and further, that Mexico's role has changed, as it now provides a bridge for trade between East Asia and the United States. These new developments in the pattern of machinery trade reflect reductions in services link costs, the further evolution of production sharing in the U.S.--Mexico nexus, and the strengthening competitiveness of production networks based in East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a fear among East Asian governments that China's rapid export driven growth is significantly impairing the export performance of their own countries. The common belief among East Asian economies is that to remain competitive they must improve the quality of their exports relative to those of China. In this paper, we show how the emergence of China has affected the quality of its exports and imports to and from Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. Specifically, we combine a measure of marginal intra-industry trade (IIT) concerned with the adjustment implications of changes in matched trade, a measure of vertical and horizontal intra-industry trade concerned with the differences in product quality and a new dynamic measure of quality differentiated IIT. Our results suggest that Singapore and Malaysia have managed to maintain and even improve their position as the exporter of high quality varieties in bilateral trade with to China despite China's rapid development and export orientated growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The emergence of production networks has changed the structure of international trade, which is characterized by a large share of intra-regional trade flows and a rising value of intermediate goods trade or network trade between countries within the same region. This paper investigates the change in impact of trade determinants with the formation of regional production networks. At the global level, the results show that intermediate goods exports are more sensitive to trade barriers than total goods exports. At the regional level, the comparison reveals that, despite the efforts directed toward export market diversification in East Asia, the region is still more dependent on other regions' economic conditions than the European Union is. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article comments on an article by professor Anwar Nasution on the role of East Asia in addressing global imbalances in savings and investment. It provides an overview on the surpluses and account deficit of East Asian countries, the U.S. and European countries. It discusses the Asian financial crisis which resulted to the accumulation of foreign exchange reserves. It explores Nasution's three suggested policies on investment and trade, exchange rate and protectionism in the U.S.

Using a modified gravity model and the cross-sectional data of East Asian economies, the present paper presents evidence that supports the view that the effect of distance-related transaction costs on trade tends to fall over time. Overall religious influence on foreign trade exists in the post-Cold War period but not during the Cold War period. The effects of language on inter-regional trade and of religion on intra-regional trade both weaken over time. In all cases, religion tends to have more significant influences on intra-regional trade than language, and language tends to exert more significant influences on inter-regional trade than religion. Finally, from 1985 to 1995 there is an indication that: (i) English becomes more important for inter-regional trade; (ii) Bahasa, English and Khmer become less important for intra-regional trade; and (iii) Chinese plays an increasing role in both intra-regional and inter-regional trade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

International product fragmentation--the cross-border dispersion of component production/assembly within vertically integrated production processes--is an important feature of the deepening structural interdependence of the world economy. This paper examines the implications of this phenomenon for global and regional trade patterns, with special emphasis on countries in East Asia, using a new data set culled from the United Nations Commodity Trade Statistics Database. It is found that, while "fragmentation trade" has generally grown faster than total world trade in manufacturing, the degree of dependence of East Asia on this new form of international specialization is proportionately larger than that of North America and Europe. The upshot is that international product fragmentation has made East Asian growth increasingly reliant on extra-regional trade, strengthening the case for a global, rather than a regional, approach to trade and investment policymaking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this paper is to establish conceptual foundations of analyzing the economic dimensions of Brexit. The International Financial-Trade Exchange Leaking Index (TIFTEL-Index) attempts to analyze and compare pre-Brexit versus post-Brexit international trade and international financial transactions between East and Southeast Asia and Europe. TIFTEL-index is based on three main variables, namely (1) international trade exchange marginal rate (∆Τ′), (2) international financial exchange marginal rate (∆σ′), and (3) GDP in real prices growth marginal rate (∆γ). Simulation findings indicate that Brexit will have only a limited negative effect on the world economy. In addition, Brexit will affect East Asia more than Southeast Asia region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines effects of exchange rate changes on technology-intensive exports for five Northeast Asian economies: China, Hong Kong, Japan, Republic of Korea (ROK) and Taiwan. In these economies, China, Hong Kong and Taiwan have increased the shares of high-skill and technology-intensive exports (usually finished goods) while Japan has highly concentrated on medium-skill and technology-intensive exports (mainly intermediate goods). ROK has shifted its exports from finished to intermediate goods following Japan. Panel dynamic Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) with heterogeneous time trends was applied to trade data during the period 1995–2011. Our estimation results revealed that exports with high skill and technology intensity are more sensitive to real exchange rates in China and Taiwan, while exports with medium skill and technology intensity are very sensitive to exchange rate changes except for China. These results are consistent with the current roles of those economies in the regional production networks. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to analyze the "following" behavior of six currencies in East Asia to RMB before and after the "financial crisis". Design/methodology/approach - Using foreign exchange spot rate data from 2005 to 2013, the authors investigate the dynamic relationship of RMB and six East Asia currencies with method of DCC-GARCH and quantile regression. Findings - The authors get such conclusions: first, most currencies indeed "follow" RMB in whole sample period but the correlation is "time-varying"; second, the degree of co-movement increased as a whole, which reflects that the influence of China in East Asia rose continuously; third, the East Asian currencies behaved differently before the crisis, but reveal some similarities after the crisis, and prefer to "follow" when RMB depreciates and reluctant to follow when RMB appreciates at a comparatively large degree. The authors argue that it may be related to the different macroeconomic environment faced by East Asia region before and after the crisis, the rising economic influence of China and the development of RMB internationalization's practice. Originality/value - The effort could strength the understanding to the "following" behavior of East Asia currencies to RMB, the authors also point out that RMB has been as regional currency anchor, but the role of anchor is unstable, and is affected by international economic circumstance, China should adapt some methods to strength RMB's influence to East Asia currency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author presents his comments on Mitsuyo Ando and Fukunari Kimura's study on the developments in trade between East Asia and North America focusing on developments in machinery trade. Topics discussed include their examination on how distance and country size shaped international trade flows and suggestions that production network activities that connect locations in North America and East Asia were strengthened.

The article comments on Prema-chandra Athukorala's paper on the global product-sharing network as the key to explaining East Asian trade. It talks about the issue of trade characteristics in three areas, namely data, econometric analysis, and foreign direct investment views of components trade. It warns against misunderstandings in data aggregation, which is said to suffer from fallacy of composition. On econometrics, it suggests bilateral trade flows instead of trade with the world to delineate the nature of intra-regional trade characteristics.

The author presents a response to an article on the role of foreign direct investment (FDI) in intra-regional trade within regional production networks in East Asia. The author cites the distinct approach used in the article which utilized econometric models in assessing foreign direct investment (FDI) from the U.S., Japan and South Korea. The author considers the premise that it is through FDI in which multinational enterprises (MNE) participate in international production.

The article presents a summary of general discussion on the paper "Offshoring and Trade in East Asia: A Statistical Analysis." According to Fredrik Sjöholm, the paper was an important contribution to the few existing firm-level studies about outsourcing and research and development (R&D). Hea Jung Hyun claimed that her study on the subject area has more evidence supporting the hypothesis that monitoring cost is a key determinant of a company's involvement in overseas research and development activities.

Many people have a vague notion that the room for expanding international production networks is almost exhausted and that therefore international trade has slowed down since the recovery from the great trade collapse. This paper presents evidence against such a belief in the East Asian context by classifying finely disaggregated trade data based on the stages of the production process. The trade slowdown was attributed mainly to sluggishness of trade in primary goods and processed raw materials. In contrast, East Asian trade in manufactured parts and components and the assembled end-products within production networks continued to expand steadily. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examine potential slowdown in international production networks in East Asia. Topics discussed include international trade emerged as the key issue in world economy; introduction on factors affecting trade patterns in primary goods; and the expansion of trade within international production networks.

The article presents a general discussion on potential slowdown growth in international production networks in East Asia. Topics discussed include information on increase in domestic production of parts and components contributed to decline the export of it at the global level; opportunities for export-oriented industrialization; and information on the increase in intermediate goods trade.

This article aims to analyze Russia's efforts, both domestically and internationally, to combat illicit crab harvesting and safeguard its marine resources. A comparison of total crab imports and allowable catch in Russian waters from 1990 to 2022 indicates a peak in shadow activities during the mid-2000s, with a cessation of large-scale illegal fishing observed since 2013. A narrative analysis of institutional shifts reveals that the bolstering of internal oversight, heightened accountability for harvesters, and enhanced global cooperation have been pivotal in fostering these positive dynamics. Concerning trends, however, emerged towards the beginning of the current decade, indicating potential instability within the legal framework of the crab industry. Persistent statistical discrepancies in trade with South Korea, diminishing institutional capacities within Russia to combat shadow activities, and heightened media scrutiny of illicit crab harvesting underscore the need for sustained vigilance in addressing both internal and external dimensions of this multifaceted problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For the last 15 years, computers and electronic goods have been the leading export categories from East Asia to the rest of the world. They are produced within regional production and distribution networks. Japan, South Korea and Taipei, China, construct technology-intensive parts and components and ship them to China and ASEAN for processing by lower-skilled workers and reexport. This paper presents evidence that exchange rate appreciations in countries supplying parts and components to East Asian assembly economies would curtail these sophisticated exports, while exchange rate appreciations in assembly economies would not. The evidence also indicates that decreases in income in importing countries would significantly reduce computer and electronic goods exports. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper empirically examines the role of financial sector development in influencing the impact of exchange rate volatility on the exports of five emerging East Asian countries - China, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand - using a GMM-IV estimation method. The results indicate that the effect of exchange rate volatility on exports is conditional on the level of financial sector development. The less financially developed an economy, the more its exports are adversely affected by exchange rate volatility. In addition, a stable exchange rate seems to be a necessary condition to achieve export promotion via a currency depreciation in these economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the determinants of exports in eight East and Southeast Asian economies, with an emphasis on the increasing importance of parts and components in total exports. To see whether exports in parts and components are ‘special’ and to allow comparisons, export equations are estimated for three different export categories: total merchandise exports, manufacturing exports and exports of machinery and transport equipment (SITC 7). The analysis is based on data for 1993–2008, a period over which parts and components trade burgeoned. The estimations indicate that the growing importance in the export composition of parts and components within vertically integrated cross-border production processes has tended to weaken the nexus of real exchange rate and export performance. World demand and supply-side factors, including foreign direct investment, tend to become more crucial in determining export performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates the impact of intra-regional real exchange rate flexibility on East Asian exports. The hypothesis is that the impact would be negative for East Asian countries regardless of their exchange rate regimes. The results validate the hypothesis. The findings show that for Chinese exports the long-run effect is as much as that of a real appreciation of renminbi. By contrast, for Japanese exports the effect is three times larger than that of a real appreciation of the yen. The findings imply that a regional currency basket mechanism would lessen the adverse effect of exchange rate flexibility and engineer a collective exchange rate adjustment for resolving the global payment imbalance against East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper argues that East Asian regionalism is fragile, since (i) each nation's industrial competitiveness depends on the smooth functioning of "Factory Asia" — in particular, on intra-regional trade; (ii) the unilateral tariff-cutting that created "Factory Asia" is not subject to WTO discipline (bindings); (iii) there is no "top-level management" to substitute for WTO discipline, i.e., to ensure that bilateral trade tensions — tensions that are inevitable in East Asia — do not spillover into region-wide problems due to lack of cooperation and communication. This paper argues that the window of opportunity for East Asian "vision" was missed; what East Asia needs now is "management", not vision. East Asia should launch a "New East Asian Regional Management Effort", with a reinforced ASEAN + 3 being the most likely candidate for the job. The first priority should be to bind the region's unilateral tariff cuts in the WTO. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we explore three important areas where deeper trade and financial integration in East Asia can influence: (1) business cycle co-movements in the region, (2) the extent of risk sharing across countries and (3) price co-movements across countries. We find evidence that trade integration enhances co-movements of output but not of consumption across countries. Especially the fact that trade integration does not raise co-movements of consumption as much as that of output is interpreted as trade integration does not improve the extent of risk sharing. Co-movements of price arise most significantly as trade integration deepens, lowering the border effects and allowing better opportunities for resource reallocation across countries. In contrast, financial integration demonstrates much weaker evidence of enhancing co-movements across countries. Deeper financial integration improves price co-movements weakly but does not enhance output or consumption co-movements at all. However, since the current level of financial integration in East Asia is quite low, our evidence is too early to firmly determine the role of financial integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]