Impact of Digital Trade on Export Competitiveness: Evidence from Chinese Enterprises Using FEM

Digital trade has become one of the most important parameters in global trade in recent times. The presence of digital trade helps smaller businesses integrate into international models. However, the micro-level impact of firms’ digital trade capabilities on their export competitiveness remains unknown. To address this issue, this paper uses firm-specific data from China and analyses the impact of digital trade score on export competitiveness. Doing so, 9705 firm-year observations were analysed between 2013 and 2023. A FEM Model and GMM Model was utilised to analyse the same. The analysis found that the digital score has a negative impact on the competitiveness of exports by 13.54 per cent. GMM found a negative impact of 6.29 per cent. Factors such as intangible assets impacted exports positively, whereas ROA and leverage had a negative impact.