Following the new strand in the new trade theory literature that focuses on firm heterogeneity initiated by the Melitz [2003] model, in this paper we investigate the determinants of export activity of firms in the Visegrad-4 countries. The study covers the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia and is based on firm level data for the 2002–2009 period.We will start with estimating probit regressions for the pooled dataset that includes all V-4 countries and will then disaggregate the sample into particular countries. Our preliminary estimation results obtained for the whole V-4 sample indicate that the probability of exporting increases with the higher share of university graduates in productive employment, larger spending on R&D projects, the use of foreign technology licenses, foreign ownership, higher productivity and company size. The results obtained for particular V-4 countries reveal some degree of heterogeneity among those countries.

This paper contributes to the discussion about economic effects of monetary integration and the problem of model stability during economic crisis. The fundamental goal of this research is twofold: firstly, to investigate the effect of different stages of economic integration on export to EU and non-EU countries, from becoming a member of the European Union (EU) to the Eurozone (EZ). Secondly, to check whether the functional form of the model can be considered stable over time as in the meantime the world entered the crisis phase. For an empirical test a data set covering the period from 1994 to 2010 has been used. The standard factors of gravity models, such as the size of the markets of trade partners, GDP per capita of trade partners etc. have been tested in the log-linear specification of the gravity model. In order to control the effect of monetary integration, several dummy variables indicating the process of monetary integration were added. Positive effects of growing GDP and GDP per capita, as usual, are expected. What is also assumed is that participation in amonetary union does not enhance exports to the EU and Eurozone countries. To test for this hypothesis, and to exercise control over additional factors, a model based on panel data with the use of Hausman-Taylor method was estimated. Surprisingly, it was found out that even though the impact of joining the EU and ERM on export has been positive, joining the Eurozone has given the opposite result. It will also be demonstrated that some of the parameters could be considered stable in the long run, but this is not relevant to all of them. Keywords: international trade, monetary integration, gravity model.

In this paper, impacts of corruption on the level of trade protectionism, trade openness, and imports are analyzed. It is argued that special interest groups who are lobbying with corrupted governments might seek more benefits in some special subgroups of imports. Possible country and time specific fixed effects, endogeneity and some other problems in the regressions are controlled to achieve results that are more robust. Corruption measures from two different sources of Worldwide Governance Indicator and Transparency International website are analyzed in two separate similar approaches. It is finally concluded that both measures of corruption implicate negative influence on only one import subgroup, while there is no significant impact on protectionism measures.