Import licenses, intermediaries, and price pass-through: Evidence from the Chinese steel market

Abstract

This study examines the impact of abolishing the exclusive license of importing iron ore on price pass-through in the Chinese steel market. We model the intermediate traders' role in alleviating market uncertainties, which have a critical impact on price pass-through. In addition, we leverage the monthly iron ore import prices and steel market prices in Chinese cities, and employ a difference-in-difference framework to empirically analyze the impact of the import license reform on price pass-through. We show that the reform on average reduces the price pass-through by 15 percentage points, which is around 3 points further in treated cities. Our findings imply the price pass-through hinges on market uncertainties, and the reform, although eliminating double marginalization, makes downstream steel producers have to face market uncertainties directly, and results in a lower price pass-through.