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This chapter provides a theory model of trade finance to explain the “great trade collapse.” The model shows that, first, the riskiness of international transactions rises relative to domestic transactions during economic downturns; and second, the exclusive use of a letter of credit in international transactions exacerbates a collapse in trade during a financial crisis. The basic model considers banks’ optimal screening decisions in the presence of counterparty default risks. In equilibrium, banks will maintain a higher precision screening test for domestic firms and a lower precision screening test for foreign firms, which constitutes the main mechanism of the model.