Market microstructure in a global B2B network

On‐line marketplaces raise several interesting issues, among them the relevance of location when content is digitized, and the assessment of a supplier's capabilities when buyers worldwide only have electronic contact with sellers. In global B2B on‐line marketplaces, market microstructures, i.e. which firms compete for the same customers, are thus likely to be influenced by how customers value location and firm capabilities in their decisions to do business with different suppliers on‐line. We suggest that both these sets of attributes will continue to matter on‐line—firms possessing similar capabilities, as well as firms that are similar in location by country, time zones or clusters, will compete for business from the same customers. We model the similarity in competitive positions between pairs of firms based on the overlap in their customer networks, using data on actual interactions between supplier and customer banks on an electronic trading system. Using QAP network regression techniques on the 100 largest banks in this industry, we find that similarity in capabilities influences who competes with whom, and that location still matters in a global B2B exchange. Interestingly, location influences who a firm's competitors are, but not where its customers are from. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Competition Policy: What are the Costs and Benefits of Measuring its Costs and Benefits?

Summary  Competition authorities are increasingly measuring the effects of their enforcement actions, seeking a robust justification for the proliferation of competition policy. We highlight the importance of identifying the right counterfactual against which to measure effects, and set out the relevant categories of costs and benefits. We then explore how a balance can be struck between the benefits and inherent limitations of these measurement exercises. Relatively crude analyses of cartel action benefits can be sufficient to achieve public legitimacy for competition policy. Assessing the effects of merger and conduct inquiries is often ambiguous, but could be used to improve decision-making processes. Director and Managing Consultant, respectively, at Oxera, Oxford and London. The valuable comments of Fod Barnes, Kerry Hughes and an anonymous referee are gratefully acknowledged. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors alone.     

Competition and Information Production in Market Maker Models

Abstract:   The microstructure literature models the mechanisms through which fundamental information is incorporated into market prices. This paper extends previous models by endogenising information production and analysing incentives for costly information production. In contrast to the existing literature, increasing the number of informed traders can result in reduced price informativeness. When prices have an allocative role this has welfare consequences: the regulatory implications of a dichotomy between private and public incentives for information gathering are discussed.     

营销角度的特许经营及其竞争法上的思考

特许经营是一种新型的销售方式,作为企业分销系统的构成要素,能够起到降低风险,沟通生产与消费的作用。然而在实际经营过程中也会出现许多诸如指定购买与搭售、联合定价、独占经营等违反竞争法的问题。为适应不断变化的竞争形势,应从竞争法的层面上对其加以规制。     

基于更新理论的产品保修策略模型

产品价格的确定不仅取决于生产成本 ,还应包涵服务成本。非价格竞争下 ,产品保修是售后服务的主要内容。本文运用更新报酬理论 ,建立了产品保修策略模型。模型表明 :在消费转型时代 ,只有引入产品的差异性、降低生产成本、提高产品质量、延长产品寿命、制订合适的保修策略 ,才能保障合理的厂商利润 ,有效刺激需求。     

Regulatory reform of the UK gas market: The sase of the storage auction

The UK gas industry has undergone major changes since it was privatised in 1986 as a fully integrated monopoly. The most significant of these has occurred not as a result of the privatisation legislation but by the intervention of the ordinary competition authorities in support of an active industry regulator. While price capping continues to be used as the primary instrument for welfare protection against the still substantial monopolistic powers of the incumbent, new competition (which has been positively encouraged) has had the greater impact on prices and choice. Recently, however, the regulator has encouraged the use of auctions for the sale of storage capacity. This paper considers the merits of auctions and makes a tentative evaluation of their effectiveness. Further use of auctions is recommended but reserve prices are considered inappropriate where monopoly power still remains.     

Scarcity and appropriative competition

This paper formalizes the commonsensical hypothesis that resource scarcity causes a large allocation of time and effort to appropriative competition. Our main innovation is to model explicitly the positive intertemporal effect of consumption on the probability of survival. The critical assumption is that this effect becomes stronger as resources become scarcer. We also show that anticipated future resource abundance increases the incremental value of survival and, consequently, amplifies the current allocation of time and effort to appropriative competition. Interestingly, if resources are currently scarce, then larger anticipated future abundance can cause a big enough increase in the time and effort allocated to appropriative competition to result in a decrease in the sum of current and expected future utility, a “paradox of anticipated abundance”.     

The causes and consequences of sector‐level job flows in Poland*

We look at the determinants and consequences of job reallocation in the 22 2‐digit sectors of the manufacturing industry in Poland over the period 1995–99. We find that import competition and a competitive market structure (weak concentration) have a positive and significant effect on job reallocation. Moreover, higher job reallocation is associated with higher labour productivity growth in some specifications. This confirms implications from neo‐Schumpeterian growth models: one channel through which competition might positively affect growth is through the reallocation of scarce resources from declining firms to rising ones. JEL Classifications: F16, J24, J6, O3, P3.     

How Far Can Chinese Motorcycles Roar？——A Study on Motorcycle Export of China

Export of Chinese motorcycles increased dramatically in the past few years. This growth, however, is encountered with many fatal problems, such as over-intensified export market, low value-added, overwhelming fake commodities, awkward technology innovation and intellectual property rights protection, bitter competition from foreign counterparts, and anti-dumping charges by foreign countries, etc. This paper sheds light on these problems and challenges and puts forward suggestion accordingly.     

广东本地服装品牌的市场培育

本地原创品牌的发展塑造需要坚持,也需要本地市场的支持。品牌经营者必须充分了解市场需求,有针对性地进行市场培育,同时结合自身条件进行品牌营销,才能在市场上取胜。文章基于服装品牌消费者层次分析,提出以差异性的品牌推广方式来培育忠诚顾客的若干策略,从而提升原创品牌的市场竞争力。