Bank of Greece Economic Bulletin, Issue 49
30/07/2019 - Press Releases
Today the Bank of Greece published the latest issue of its Economic Bulletin (No. 49/July 2019).
The articles published in the Economic Bulletin reflect the views of the authors and not necessarily those of the Bank of Greece.
Issue 49 features the following five articles:
Theodora Kosma, Pavlos Petroulas and Evangelia Vourvachaki: “Job flows in Greece during the recent years”
The article analyses job flows in Greece using detailed data on private sector dependent employment for 2015-2017, a period characterised by brisk employment growth. The authors find that during the years reviewed by the study there is a significant amount of job creation and job destruction going on at the same time. Moreover, job reallocation increases with firm size, which is at odds with findings for other countries. In terms of employee age categories, job creation is the strongest for those over 44 years old. The regression results imply that, at the sectoral level, job creation is negatively correlated with wage growth and positively correlated with capital intensity and net firm growth. By contrast, job destruction at the sectoral level is negatively correlated with net firm growth and positively correlated with export intensity, which may reflect a creative destruction process as the Greek economy is becoming more open.
Marios Papaspyrou and Athanasios Petralias: “The Greek Shipping Estimation Model”
The Greek Shipping Estimation Model aims to provide a coherent statistical framework for the estimation of Balance of Payments (BoP) items related to shipping activity, based on administrative sources and commercial databases.
Given the multi-territorial nature of the shipping sector and its complex group structures, the estimation of shipping activity is one of the most challenging tasks in terms of official statistics. This is of particular importance to Greece, whose merchant fleet plays a strategic role in the transportation of commodities across the world. The statistical framework presented in the present study may well be applied by other countries for BoP compilation purposes, as well as by researchers and analysts seeking to estimate revenues and expenses related to shipping activity.
The Greek Shipping Estimation Model adopts a granular-level approach, with vessel-by-vessel characterisation, involving three steps. Firstly, the cluster, the main counterparts and the types of BoP transactions that take place and can be estimated are defined. Secondly, the population is defined, including companies that are legal owners, operators or ship-managers, and the vessels to be taken into account. Finally, all BoP transactions for a given vessel are estimated on a monthly basis.
The maritime cluster structure is discussed, along with guidelines on how to define the resident population in line with the economic ownership principle. A detailed statistical framework for the estimation of all shipping-related transactions is presented, including vessels’ revenues, bunkers costs, port expenses, manning costs, administrative costs, and other BoP items.
Ioanna Mpardaka and Christos Papazoglou: “The determinants of Greece’s export supply of oil”
In the last fifteen years or so Greece has emerged as an important exporter of refined oil products, which led to an increase of its share in total world exports as well as to the improvement of the country’s oil balance and overall current account. The article presents an empirical investigation of the factors that determine Greece’s oil export supply contributing to the improvement of the country’s export performance. The analysis focuses on the supply side, considering the traditional specification of the imperfect substitute model by Goldstein and Khan, which is augmented by introducing the role of investment in the sector. The empirical estimation involves the cointegration methodology, distinguishing between long-run and short-run effects. The findings show that there exist significant stable cointegrating relationships across the traditional and the augmented specifications as well as short-run effects. Investment activity by the oil companies has been an enhancing factor of the sector’s exports, revealing itself in linear and non-linear form. Furthermore, significant long-run and short-run effects stem from domestic demand and the refining margin. In particular, the negative effect of domestic demand reflects primarily the impact of the recession on oil exports. That is, falling domestic demand necessitates the channelling of excess supply to external markets, thereby mitigating the adverse effects of the recession.
Evangelia Kasimati and Nikolaos Veraros: “Raising capital through issuance of common shares by Greek-controlled maritime companies in US capital markets”
The article reviews the equity offerings of Greek-controlled maritime companies in US capital markets. The authors specifically examine the percentage of equity funds raised by Greek interests compared to the overall international maritime raisings in the United States, the amount of money raised, the pricing of the offerings, the performance of the stocks when the new shares commenced trading, the offering price in relation to the initial price range, the issuance costs, the existence of overallotments, and the use of the proceeds. Activity is broken down per vessel type, company type, and equity issue type. The authors find that the US equity issues boosted substantially the growth of the Greek-controlled fleet over the last two decades. They also identify a more intense issuing activity at the peak of the shipping cycle, which could jeopardise the companies’ capital structure when freight rates and vessel values correct downwards.
Maria Albani, Sofia Anyfantaki and Sophia Lazaretou: “How do digital technologies drive Greece’s economic growth? Opportunities and challenges”
Digital transformation is a driver of economic growth by improving labour productivity, increasing competitiveness and exploiting the potential of e-commerce. Digital revolution is “a game changer” as it reshapes the way production, distribution and consumption are organised within firms and across industries and markets, thus making traditional production models obsolete. By leveraging its human capital stock, Greece can catch up with the other EU-28 countries and gain multiple advantages from digital technologies, such as higher total factor productivity, enhanced competitiveness and increased extroversion. The end result will be sustainable growth. This article aims to present the digital performance of the Greek economy and society and discusses how digital technologies can contribute to Greece’s economic growth, with a particular focus on jobs, skills and the learning ecosystem. Given that FinTech is a driver of financial sector development, the authors also explore the implications of digitalisation for the Greek financial system. To this end, specific policy recommendations covering five policy areas are set out with a view to harnessing the emerging opportunities and ensuring that the benefits are shared by all.
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Issue 49 also includes the abstracts of Working Papers published by the Special Studies Section of the Bank’s Economic Analysis and Research Department between January and June 2019.
The full text of Issue 49 is available on the Bank of Greece website: www.bankofgreece.gr