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This paper explores how the international exposure of companies influenced their strategies in responding to the COVID-19 crisis, and the extent to which they were affected. Our conceptual framework formulates two hypotheses that can be empirically tested. First, we posit that international companies, due to their connections with domestic and foreign markets, are more vulnerable to the crisis, being affected through both demand and supply channels. Second, despite their heightened exposure, we anticipate that international companies will exhibit greater resilience during the crisis compared to their domestic counterparts. This resilience can be attributed to their enhanced global connectivity and productivity. The empirical analysis, based on a large firm-level survey undertaken in 2020 in 133 countries, documents how different types of firms were affected by COVID-19 crisis and how they reacted to the disruptions, providing empirical support for both hypotheses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates the relation between technical regulations and firms' export dynamics using country-sector indicators from two firm-level datasets—the novel UN ITC NTM Business Surveys and the World Bank Exporter Dynamics Database—for 18 developing countries over the 2010–2014 period. The results from the analysis indicate that export markets where exporters perceive technical regulations as more burdensome are characterized by a lower number of exporters, a lower value of exports, and a higher concentration rate. These results are in line with the prediction of the heterogeneous firms' trade theory (Melitz, 2003): additional trade costs are expected to push some firms out of exporting, therefore reducing the total number of exporters and increasing concentration. Also, technical regulations hit small firms' exports twice as hard as they hit large firms, confirming that smaller firms react more strongly to changes in trade costs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]