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Both financial market deregulation and global external imbalance feature prominently among the potential causes of the 2008 global financial crisis, but they have been largely examined separately. In this paper, we take a different angle and investigate the relationship between financial market regulation and current account imbalances, an area for which limited empirical evidence exists. Using a large data set that includes 66 developed and emerging and other developing countries and a fixed effects identification strategy. We find robust and consistent evidence that countries employing significant repressive financial policies are more likely to run current account surpluses. Specifically, interest rate controls, state ownership in the banking sector and capital account controls are the main policies contributing to external imbalances. Analysis of possible mechanisms confirm that financial repression mainly affects external imbalances through its effect on industrial structure. Furthermore, financial repression has a larger effect on the current account in East Asia than the rest of the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The vegetation uptake of atmospheric elemental mercury [Hg(0)] and its subsequent littering are critical processes of the terrestrial Hg cycles. There is a large uncertainty in the estimated global fluxes of these processes due to the knowledge gap in the underlying mechanisms and their relationship with environmental factors. Here, we develop a new global model based on the Community Land Model Version 5 (CLM5-Hg) as an independent component of the Community Earth System Model 2 (CESM2). We explore the global pattern of gaseous elemental Hg [Hg(0)] uptake by vegetation and the spatial distribution of litter Hg concentration constrained by observed datasets as well as its driving mechanism. The annual vegetation uptake of Hg(0) is estimated as 3132 Mg yr−1, which is considerably higher than previous global models. The scheme of dynamic plant growth including stomatal activities substantially improves the estimation for global terrestrial distribution of Hg, compared to the leaf area index (LAI) based scheme that is often used by previous models. We find the global distribution of litter Hg concentrations driven by vegetation uptake of atmospheric Hg(0), which are simulated to be higher in East Asia (87 ng/g) than in the Amazon region (63 ng/g). Meanwhile, as a significant source for litter Hg, the formation of structural litter (cellulose litter + lignin litter) results in a lagging effect between Hg(0) deposition and litter Hg concentration, implying the buffering effect of vegetation on the air-land exchange of Hg. This work highlights the importance of vegetation physiology and environmental factors in understanding the vegetation sequestration of atmospheric Hg globally, and calls for greater efforts to protect forests and afforestation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]