Transshipment Hubs, Trade, and Supply Chains

Anh D. Do, Sharat Ganapati, Woan Foong Wong and Oren Ziv

No 34361, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: The majority of global trade moves by sea through hub-and-spoke shipping networks. We investigate the returns to being a hub country by analyzing how transshipment activity shapes trade and supply chains. We show that most US imports---especially from smaller origin countries---are transshipped via key hubs, and transshipment is positively correlated with the hub's product-level trade. Leveraging the indirect shipping network structure to construct an instrument, we find that transshipment increases hubs' imports from origins for which they facilitate trade and exports of downstream goods, highlighting their central role in shaping modern global trade and supply chain dynamics.

JEL-codes: F10 F13 F14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-int, nep-net and nep-tre
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Working Paper: Transshipment Hubs, Trade, and Supply Chains (2025)
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