Financial Capacities and export success: Evidence from Small and Medium-Sized Estonian Firms

Abstract

The main objective of this paper is to investigate the relationships between exporting success and variables that affect the economic and financial structure. For a set of 242 Small and Medium-Sized Estonian firms, we will analyze how financial variables contribute to the achievement of higher export success rates. We select the relevant variables with Principal Component Analysis and use an Artificial Intelligence method (PART algorithm) to study the role of them. The results show that the more relevant financial variables to analyze the success in international market are the ones related to the liquidity of the assets, the level of interest payments, sales growth, the ones related to firms' own funds and the age of the company. In addition, although some financial factors are more significant than others, none of them is clearly a key factor for all companies and situations, that is, no single factor can lead to success or failure.