欧盟对纵向限制竞争协议的规制

纵向限制竞争协议属于欧委会竞争总司负责审查的反托拉斯业务之一。欧盟竞争总司处理纵向限制竞争协议以条约、条例和指南为法律依据,涉及大量经济分析,需要了解具体市场、行业、产品的竞争状况,是一项法律和经济分析高度结合的工作,对我国反垄断立法和执法具有参考和借鉴意义。     

欧盟竞争法对企业合营的规制

在欧盟内，几乎有一半集中是通过建立合营企业实现的，所以在企业集中控制方面，企业合营具有重要的实践意义。然而，如何控制以建立合营企业的方式实现的集中，在欧盟却一直存在着争论。从《1966年备忘录》到1989年MCR，再到1997年AMCR，欧盟有关机构都在努力为解决合营企业问题提供确定性的制度支持。     

论我国反垄断法对纵向限制竞争行为的规制

一、纵向限制竞争行为的利弊及其规制之必要性所谓纵向限制竞争行为(以下简称纵向限制行为)是指两个或两个以上在同一产业中处于不同环节或层次而有交易关系的企业,如制造商与销售商、批发商与零售商,通过合同或其他形式实施的限制竞争行为。现实当中比较常见的纵向限制行为主要有维持转售价格、搭售、独家销售协议、选择性交易、知识产权方面的协议等,它的根本特征是:行为当事人处于不同的经营层次,如制造商、批发商与零售商之间的协议,通常采用协议的形式,其直接目的是便利商品或服务的销售,对市场竞争的影响较为复杂。与横向限制行为最大…     

纵向限制反竞争效果的经济分析

纵向限制是反垄断法中的核心议题之一。由于它对竞争有着明显的限制作用,所以有必要对其进行规制。共同经销商及供应商理论、强大经销商理论能够解释纵向价格限制推动了零售商卡特尔,管理激励工具、信息工具理论能阐明纵向价格限制促进了制造商卡特尔。此外,纵向非价格限制也对竞争构成了限制。     

公用企业限制竞争行为的规制

随着中国社会主义市场经济体制的逐步建立和完善,竞争在市场经济中的作用越来越重要,但是一些企业特别是公用企业利用自身的独占地位想方设法限制竞争,扰乱了自由和公平的竞争秩序。为此,有必要对公用企业限制竞争行为进行规制。     

跨国零售商与本土制造商的纵向限制关系研究

本文通过特许费用案例分析跨国零售商与我国本土制造商的纵行限制关系,通过扩展关于买方集中、纵向限制的纵向关系模型,集中探讨了具有垄断势力的下游跨国零售商对上游供货商的纵向限制行为,最终对跨国零售商对我国本土制造商的影响提出了针对性的政策建议。     

纵向限制的竞争效果及反垄断考量

在处理纵向价格限制类案件时,我国法院和反垄断执法机构的做法存在差异。已有法院判决明确要求排除、限制竞争效果要件,而反垄断执法机构的态度则不明朗。本文认为,应结合最新的经济研究,分析纵向限制行为的品牌间竞争效果和品牌内竞争效果,重点考察品牌间竞争效果,并以此为依据起草指南,细化纵向限制类案件的处理方法。     

光伏产业的纵向限制研究——以无锡光伏产业为例

近年来,随着美国和欧盟国家不断地对我国的光伏产业进行"双反"调查,我国光伏产业由于大部分的需求在国外,严重依赖于出口,正面临着重大的危机。文章首先对国内外学者的相关理论研究进行了综述,又分析了光伏产业在原料市场和销售市场最近几年的相关情况,结合纵向限制理论构建模型分析了光伏产业的一般情况。同时结合实际对无锡市各类光伏企业的调查,提出相应的解决措施。     

产品差异化下的纵向限制及其竞争效应

垄断制造商在品牌差异度足够低时有激励实施纵向限制,但这是以消费者剩余和社会福利为代价的,而且损失都随着商品差异度特别是品牌内差异度的提高而提高.因此,纵向限制反垄断应该关注限制方非价格竞争程度较低、特别是同时被限制方非价格竞争程度较高的情况.     

浅谈国际贸易中私人限制竞争行为的法律规制

世界贸易组织的建立和其成员方相互大幅度减让关税虽然标志着世界贸易朝着自由化的方向迈进一大步,但我们还远不能说,世界贸易就已经实现了自由化。这是因为在国际贸易中,除了政府间的关税和非关税壁垒继续存在外,尤其还存在着私人限制竞争的行为,比如限制竞争协议、滥用市场支配地位以及公司过大规模的并购活动引起的经济力量过分集中。文章的目的在于探讨如何对国际贸易中私人限制竞争行为进行法律规制。原则上,私人限制竞争行为是由各国的竞争法所调整的,然而,在经济全球化条件下,许多私人限制竞争是由跨国公司实施的,具有国际性的影响,它们可能会受到许多国家法律的制约。通过系统阐述,文章认为应该在WTO的框架下探讨多边合作问题,实现国际竞争法的统一与协调,减少各国之间的冲突,促进世界贸易的自由化。     

Deep trade agreements and vertical FDI: The devil is in the details

Although pre‐1990s preferential trade agreements focused mostly on tariff liberalization, recent agreements increasingly contain deep provisions in diverse areas, such as intellectual property rights, investment and standards. At the same time, there has been a remarkable increase in the internationalization of production through foreign direct investment and outsourcing. This paper studies how deep trade agreements affect the international organization of production. Using new measures of the depth and content of preferential trade agreements and of vertical foreign direct investment, the analysis finds evidence that the depth of trade agreements is correlated with vertical foreign direct investment. Furthermore, this relationship is driven by the provisions that improve the contractibility of inputs provided by suppliers, such as standards, while provisions that increase the contractibility of headquarter services, such as intellectual property rights and investment protection, are generally negatively correlated with foreign investment. This finding is consistent with the so‐called “property rights” theory of the multinational firm according to which improving the contractibility of an input reduces the importance of giving incentives through ownership.     

新股上市首日爆炒成因分析及对策研究

深、沪市场存在新股上市首日爆炒的情况,其主要弊端在于扭曲了市场化定价机制,加大了二级市场运行风险和投资风险。影响新股上市首日爆炒的原因较为复杂,主要有制度层面、市场层面、上市公司层面和投资者层面等因素。新股上市爆炒不是简单的发行制度、交易制度改革或交易监管就能解决的问题,防控新股上市爆炒需要齐抓共管。     

Financial intermediation and endogenous risk in the banking sector

The paper revisits the impact of uncertainty on the decision problem of a bank. The bank extends risky loans to private investors and sells deposits to savers at fixed rates. The uncertainty under which deposit/loan-portfolios are chosen by banks is endogenized through an information system that conveys public signals about the return distribution of bank loans. Transparency in the banking sector is defined in terms of the reliability of these signals. We find that higher transparency always raises expected bank profits, but may lead to a higher or lower expected loan volume. Moreover, higher transparency may reduce economic welfare.     

Liberalisation,competition and ownership in the presence of vertical relations

This contribution analyses a market with an upstream bottleneck monopoly and a downstream activity that may either be vertically integrated or separated. Separation always reduces the consumer surplus, and the total surplus unless there are large cost reductions. Downstream competition from a public or private network monopoly would crowd out other firms, also when public ownership is associated with more modest objectives than welfare-maximisation. A market is therefore less likely to remain a mixed oligopoly than without vertical relations. However, private firms would survive in a moderately welfare-improving mixed oligopoly with cross-subsidisation and access charges equal to marginal costs.

Technical efficiency, market share and profitability of manufacturing firms in Cote d'Ivoire: the technology trap

This paper investigates the sources of inefficiency of firmsin Côte d'Ivoire and examines to what extent these effectstranslate into poor performance. A large majority of firms istechnically inefficient, producing far below the maximum attainableoutput level. Major cost savings can also be realised throughenlarging the scale of activities of firms. Efficiency gainsand scale advantages translate into a better competitive positionand via their impact on market share into higher profitability.However, severe growth barriers and imperfect markets keep firmsfrom realising these gains and prevent firms from catching upin technology with respect to their larger, older and oftenforeign-owned competitors.     

The (in) effectiveness of procurement auctions in the public sector

This article studies procurement auctions in the public sector using game theoretical tools. The article shows that when participants in an auction are agents with low abilities (low type), as is common in the public sector, they place the same contract request. As a result, the auction mechanism will rarely produce real competition, thus making this mechanism, which limits bidders to those already within the system, ineffective for use in the public sector job market.     

The motor vehicle industry in an emerging nation: the case of Brazil

As in other emerging nations, in Brazil, the motor vehicle industry is considered to be strategically important for economic development because of its backward and forward linkages and possibilities for export-led growth. This study analyses prospects for the industry by estimating an industry-level cost function that includes output of both vehicles and component parts with capital, labour and intermediate goods as inputs. The cost elasticity of output (an indicator of scale properties) and the elasticity relationships among inputs are explored. One unexpected outcome of the work that appears to be robust is that during early years of the study period, the industry had constant returns or even diseconomies of scale. However, during later years, when output was greater, there were economies of scale. This finding is likely the result of some combination of the entry of new firms, the development of new models or technological change. The study concludes that if firm output can be increased, economies of scale can be expected to strengthen the position of the Brazilian industry in the international marketplace.     

Intra-industry differences in vertical integration, heterogeneous costs and pricing: the case of web hosting

In many differentiated product industries, both traditional and “new economy” activities, vertically integrated firms also supply inputs to apparent rivals in the downstream business. This generates heterogeneity between low- and high-sunk cost suppliers with implications for entry and competitive conduct. The web hosting market is typical with primary suppliers operating alongside resellers who rent server space from them. We explore the impact of competition in US hosting using a unique dataset covering 15,000 packages offered by 3,500 firms. The results suggest price is sensitive to competitor clustering in quality space; an outcome consistent with easy entry for resellers with ultra-low fixed costs.

Strategic incentives under vertical integration: the case of wireline-affiliated wireless carriers and intermodal competition in the US

In its review of the Cingular/AT&T Wireless merger, the FCC noted the potentially conflicting incentives of wireline-affiliated (vertically integrated) versus independent (non-integrated) wireless carriers to act as intermodal competitors in the wireline exchange access market. Specifically, because Cingular and Verizon Wireless are owned by wireline carriers, they may have an incentive to compete “less aggressively” within their parents’ wireline territories while AT&T Wireless, an independent wireless carrier, would not. This paper examines these and other hypotheses by examining pre-merger data on the wireless plans offered by the three carriers. The empirical analysis suggests that AT&T Wireless did not design its plans based upon a regional strategy, whereas Cingular offered substantially smaller-minute wireless plans within its parents’ wireline territories. However, the results also suggest that Verizon Wireless did not design its plans in a markedly different fashion within and outside of its parent’s wireline region. It is posited that these findings might reflect the differing ownership and control structures of Cingular and Verizon Wireless.      

Trade agreements and international comovements: The case of NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement)

Business cycles correlation between Mexico and the US changed from being on a downward sloping path before 1992 to an upward sloping path after that. This paper suggests that the North American Free Trade Agreement could be the explanation. NAFTA generated not only an increase in the volume of trade but also a change in the elasticity of substitution between imports and exports. The paper tests this hypothesis using the neoclassical business cycles model. Although there are still some discrepancies between the theory and data in the degree of correlation, the direction of change in the model corresponds to the one in the data.