Abstract

This paper estimates the impact of regional export structures on the risk and return of regional export portfolios. The Ma2rkowitz model is used to assess the risk and return of ex-port products structures of three Brazilian economic regions. More specifically, the paper tests the hypothesis that economic regions with highly diversified export structure will observe mo-re efficient export portfolios than those with only moderate or no portfolio diversification. In order to test this hypothesis we used the export structures of three Brazilian economic re-gions: the South, the Southeast and the Northeast. The results show that portfolio theory can provide policymakers with an alternative way of assessing export earnings instability and export promotion strategies.