From Beijing to Bentonville: Do multinational retailers link markets?

Four of the world's five largest retailers—Walmart, Carrefour, Tesco, and Metro—entered China after 1995, following new policies that allowed foreign retailers to participate more fully in the Chinese retail market. As each retailer added both stores and global procurement centers, they created unique footprints that caused Chinese cities to be differentially exposed to the activities of these global retailers. We exploit these differences to identify the effect of multinational retailer presence on city–country exports of retail goods. We find robust evidence that increased exposure to multinational retailers was followed by rising exports. Since the export expansions are not limited to the connections formed by the retailers' bilateral networks, our evidence suggests that the growing presence of global retailers operated, at least in part, by enhancing the general export capabilities of the affected cities.