Foreign portfolio investment patterns: evidence from a gravity model

Abstract

Cross-country capital flows have been widely studied in the literature; however, why some countries may form more similar foreign investment portfolios than others has not been investigated. Using data for a broad panel of countries during the period 2002–2015, we adopt gravity equations to estimate cross-country foreign portfolio investment patterns. The main empirical results reveal that countries are more likely to form similar foreign portfolio investment patterns if: (i) countries are geographically closer; (ii) countries share the same official language; and (iii) countries adopt fixed exchange rate regimes.