Bilateral J-curve between Sri Lanka and its major trading partners

Abstract

It is widely believed that the short run effect of exchange rate depreciation on trade balance is different from the long run. In the short run, first, the trade balance deteriorates before resulting in an improvement, suggesting a J-curve pattern. Most of the empirical studies have employed aggregate trade data, while recent studies have used bilateral trade data. These studies are mostly between industrial countries, a few developing countries, but none so far for Sri Lanka. Hence, in this study, the impact of real depreciation of Sri Lankan Rupee (SLR) on the trade balance in the short run and the long run has been examined, employing bilateral trade data between Sri Lanka and its six major trading partners using the autoregressive distributed lagged (ARDL) model. The results reveal that the trade balance between Sri Lanka and its trading partners does not support the J-curve phenomenon, and also it does not have any specific pattern in response to depreciation of real exchange rate. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4038/ss.v39i1.3154 Staff Studies Vol.39(1&2) 2009 pp.69-85