Abstract: This paper adopts the analytical framework of four margins of trade to empirically analyze the impact of financing constraints on firm import behavior, and compares the differences in the impact of financing constraints on firm import behavior in the context of non-financial crises and financial crises. The main findings are: (1) Financing constraints negatively affect firms’ decision to import. Financing constraints significantly inhibit the import behavior of firms, including the scale of imports, the number of import sources, and the types of imported products. (2) The impact of financial constraint on imports is greater for domestic firms, processing trades, and firms that both import and export compared to foreign firms, general trades, and firms that only import. In addition, firms in different industries and different regions are also affected by financing constraints in different degrees. (3) Different external financial environments lead to significant differences in the impact of financial constraints on firm import behavior such that the financial crisis increased the sensitivity of firm import behavior to financial constraints. The gap between high-financing-constrained companies and low-financing-constrained companies on the four margins of import has been further widened.
