开放经济与世界经济学术报告第172期：Global Sourcing and Firm Inventory during the Pandemic

主题：Global Sourcing and Firm Inventory during the Pandemic

主讲：张红咏 高级研究员

会议时间：2023年9月26日 13:30-15:00

会议地点：经济学院714会议室

内容简介: Firms hold inventory to manage input shortages and stockout risks. This is particularly true for firms relying on international supply chains and imported inputs. Using a large-scale quarterly government survey of Japanese manufacturing firms (Q1 2015 – Q2 2021), we examine firm-level inventory adjustments to supply chain shocks and focus on firms that sourced inputs globally during the pandemic. We find that before the pandemic, relative to firms that purchase inputs only domestically, importing firms tend to have larger inventories (inventories over sales) in materials, work-in-process (intermediate goods), and finished goods, even after controlling for firm size. After the pandemic, importers significantly and persistently increased their inventories of intermediate inputs, especially in the case of firms with ex-ante higher import intensity and multinational firms that experienced supply chain disruptions in China. These results suggest the possibility of a shift from just-in-time to just-in-case production during the pandemic. We then discuss the role of inventories as a buffer against input shortages and other factors affecting inventory holdings, such as the prefecture-level severity of COVID-19 infections, industry-level input and output prices, and firm-level financial constraints and uncertainties regarding the economic and business outlook.

嘉宾简介：张红咏现任日本经济产业研究所(RIETI)高级研究员，兼任日本财务省财务综合政策研究所(PRI)客座研究官。日本京都大学博士。他的主要研究领域包括国际贸易，跨国公司与外商直接投资，以及中国经济。已在 Journal of Monetary Economics, European Economic Review, Journal of Comparative Economics, The World Economy等国际学术期刊发表论文十余篇。American Economic Review: Insights, Journal of Development Economics, The World Economy 等期刊的匿名审稿人。曾经兼任经济合作与发展组织(OECD)，亚洲开发银行(ADB)，日本经济产业省(METI)顾问等职位。