数字金融发展与跨境贸易人民币结算——来自省级—国家跨境贸易人民币结算数据的经验证据

Development of Digital Finance and Cross-border Trade RMB Settlement:Empirical Evidence from Provincial-National Cross-border Trade RMB Settlement Data

推动跨境贸易本币结算是稳慎扎实推进人民币国际化的关键动力。数字金融作为数字化手段与金融服务的融合,对于推动跨境贸易人民币结算具有重要意义。本文使用2012—2019年省份—国家层面的跨境贸易人民币结算数据,通过构建省级层面的数字金融指数,考察数字金融发展对跨境贸易人民币结算的影响。结果发现,数字金融发展可以显著提升跨境贸易人民币结算的规模和份额,且对金融发展禀赋较低的地区、发展中国家、非国际四大货币经济体以及与中国签订自由贸易协定和双边货币互换协议的国家促进作用更大。数字金融主要通过金融渠道与贸易渠道促进跨境贸易人民币结算。其中,金融渠道表现为数字金融通过提升货币结算效率使得人民币交易成本降低,贸易渠道表现为数字金融通过缓解企业融资约束使得企业贸易市场份额增加,这两方面均能促进跨境贸易人民币结算。进一步研究发现,金融双向开放水平的提高会显著增强数字金融发展对跨境贸易人民币结算的促进作用。本文的研究厘清了数字金融与对外贸易本币计价结算之间的影响机理,为进一步推动金融服务实体经济以及稳慎扎实推进人民币国际化提供了新的经验证据。

Advocating the principle of RMB priority in cross-border trade is crucial for promoting the internationalization of the RMB steadily and solidly.There are still obstacles to cross-border trade RMB settlement in the financial and trade aspects,such as high transaction costs,insufficient convenience in payment and settlement,and limitations in US dollar network externalities.The development of digital finance plays an indispensable role in overcoming these obstacles.Examining the impact of the development of digital finance on cross-border trade RMB settlement has profound significance in promoting financial services for the real economy and assisting RMB internationalization.Firstly,this paper constructs a provincial digital finance index and uses the RMB Cross-border Payment and Receipt Management Information System(RCPMIS)to examine whether the development of digital finance can affect the cross-border trade RMB settlement.Secondly,it explores its transmission mechanism.Finally,it examines the important role of financial two-way opening measures in promoting the economic influence of digital finance.The results indicate that the development of digital finance can significantly increase the total amount and share of cross-border trade RMB settlement,and has a greater promoting effect on regions with lower financial development endowments,developing countries,non-dominant currency economies,and countries that have signed free trade agreements and bilateral currency swap agreements with China.The development of digital finance has promoted cross-border trade RMB settlement through both financial and trade channels.The financial channel shows that digital finance reduces RMB transaction costs,and the trade channel shows that digital finance increases the trade market share of enterprises,both of which can promote cross-border trade RMB settlement.The improvement of the two-way financial openness will enhance the promoting effect of digital finance on cross-border trade RMB settlement.The contributions of this paper are as follows.Firstly,a unique RCPMIS database is used as the data source to more accurately measure the scale and share of cross-border trade RMB settlement at the provincial level,and it further investigates the driving factors of provincial-level cross-border trade RMB settlement.On the one hand,RCPMIS can compensate for the lack of statistics on China's domestic transaction settlement in the SWIFT database.On the other hand,it fills the gaps in existing research and provides policy references for relevant government departments to solve the problem of regional imbalance in cross-border trade RMB settlement.Secondly,From the perspective of financial development,the impact of digital finance on cross-border trade RMB settlement is examined.It then explores the important role of financial liberalization policy,which provides new ideas for cracking the current obstacles of cross-border trade RMB settlement.Thirdly,a detailed explanation is provided on the channels through which the development of digital finance affects cross-border trade RMB settlement,expanding research on the economic effects of the development of digital finance,which can help government departments target policy tools for the deep integration of the digital economy and the real economy.