This paper exploits the Brexit referendum as a quasi-natural experiment to investigate the effect of exchange rate and uncertainty shocks on export volumes, prices, entry and exit. We use transaction-level export data for the universe of exporters in Portugal. Using monthly observations on export quantity and price for products exported by the same firm to buyers in the UK and in other countries allows us to cleanly identify the differential response to the shock in the UK market. We find that exporters reduce the export volume and export price in the UK market after the referendum shock. We document heterogeneous responses to the shock across exporters. More productive, import-intensive and financially unconstrained exporters react to the shock by decreasing significantly more their export prices to the UK so that their export volumes decrease by less. We also find that goods with higher elasticity of substitution experienced a lower reduction in export price and a higher reduction in export volume. The effects of the shock are significantly larger for durable goods than for non-durable goods. The referendum shock also contributed to deter export entry to the UK market and reduce the probability of continuing to export in the UK.

本文将英国脱欧公投作为一项准自然实验，研究汇率和不确定性冲击对出口量、价格、进入和退出的影响。我们使用葡萄牙所有出口商的交易级出口数据。使用每月观察同一家公司向英国和其他国家的买家出口的产品的出口数量和价格，我们可以清楚地确定对英国市场冲击的不同反应。我们发现出口商在公投冲击后降低了英国市场的出口量和出口价格。我们记录了出口商对冲击的不同反应。生产力更高，进口密集型和财务不受约束的出口商通过大幅降低对英国的出口价格来应对冲击，从而减少出口量。我们还发现，替代弹性较高的商品出口价格下降幅度较小，出口量下降幅度较大。冲击对耐用品的影响明显大于对非耐用品的影响。公投冲击也阻碍了出口进入英国市场，降低了继续在英国出口的可能性。