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Cross‐asset order flow provides an incremental and novel nonlinear price discovery channel. Structural vector autoregressions of synchronized intraday message data reveal distinct patterns in the comovement of order flow and its influence on returns and volatility. While cross‐market order flow usually reconciles prices through small‐stakes arbitrage in periods of low volatility and comovement during medium volatility associated with information arrival, it can exacerbate price dislocation from fundamental values during extraordinary volatility. While applying market‐wide circuit breakers (MWCB) mitigates the extreme negative spillovers by jointly halting markets, we identify room for further harmonization during the MWCB market reopening process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study finds that in an international mixed oligopoly at free entry equilibrium, social welfare under import tariff cum privatization is higher than output subsidy cum privatization, and the dual subsidy‐tariff policy cum privatization degenerates into a single tariff policy cum privatization. The reason is that an output subsidy or the dual subsidy‐tariff policy will incentivize domestic private firms to enter the free‐entry equilibrium. Thus, the number of domestic firms with free entry is excessive, and social welfare deteriorates. A privatization policy is pivotal in the long run and is still more effective than a single subsidy policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most quality‐then‐price decision models under vertical product differentiation consider a predetermined market configuration. We endogenize market configuration considering quality‐dependent marginal costs and conclude that a strictly interior full coverage duopoly holds for some parameter values, unveiling the relevance of this commonly assumed market structure. Moreover, we show that a monopoly never arises in equilibrium, and (i) there are multiple equilibria at the frontier between interior and corner full coverage duopoly, (ii) the market is fully (partially) covered when relative tastes' heterogeneity is low (high), and (iii) there is a discontinuity in the transition from partial coverage to full coverage duopoly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effective government rules and regulations, as well as the ability of the regulator to curb corruption and promote voice and accountability, can influence the ability of bank management to allocate resources and ensure high performance. Based on this assumption, we aim to find out whether institutional quality is able to improve bank performance in Italy. To do so, we rely mainly on the diversity of banks, thus capturing the different behaviors of the two main categories, i.e. cooperative and for‐profit banks. Using a parametric method, the results show a clear impact of most dimensions of institutional quality on reducing banks' cost inefficiency. Some robustness checks, especially regarding the role of market structure, confirm our findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider dynamic competition between two platform‐based products that exhibit two‐sided network effects, such as game consoles and intelligent hardware. Firms compete in terms of pricing and Research & Development investment, which are driven by consumers' marginal utility of quality, indirect network effects, and the differentiation between consumers' preference for the products. We find that with a small marginal utility of consumers, the equilibrium investment of one firm increases first and decreases later with its product quality but is not obviously sensitive to the rival's. In contrast, with a large marginal utility, if the quality of the two products is comparable, the equilibrium investment increases substantially. However, if one product pulls ahead, the other firm will stop investing. Besides, we find that when the intrinsic value and the network value coexist, the market becomes more concentrated, even when consumers' marginal utility is small. The market concentration increases in both the consumers' marginal utility and the indirect network effect but decreases in the degree of differentiation between consumers' preference toward the two products. Interestingly, we show that differentiation plays an important role in shaping the market structure only when the network effect is weak. Counterintuitively, we show that the differentiation corrodes firms' total profits, which demonstrates that less fierce competition resulting from low substitution leads to a lower profit. Additionally, we reveal that dynamic interaction between quality and installed base motivates firms to improve from a low quality, the first‐mover advantage does not ensure market dominance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use China's growth experience as a laboratory to study how reductions in administrative and regulatory entry barriers contribute to growth. We develop a model of endogenous productivity and market structure with heterogeneous firms and frictional entry and calibrate it to Chinese manufacturing firms. We show that the reduction of entry barriers brings about 1.05 percentage points of productivity growth over the 1990–2004 period, accounting for 18.3% of the productivity growth in the 2004–7 period. A decomposition exercise shows that entry mainly affects growth through promoting a more competitive market structure, which more than offsets the negative Schumpeterian effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the interactions of capital structure and product market competition under two supply chain structures: a distribution structure where two competing retailers source from a common supplier and a parallel structure where each retailer sources from a dedicated supplier. The analyses demonstrate that if the retailers have access to external credits, they will borrow more (less), buy more (less), and incur a higher (lower) default probability under a parallel structure than under a distribution structure if the retailers sell substitutes (complements). The retailers' leverage improves the profit of their upstream suppliers and of the channel but improves their own profits only if they sell complements. If they sell substitutes, borrowing makes them worse off, leading to the prisoner's dilemma phenomenon. If only one retailer has access to external credit, then it will enjoy a leadership premium (loss) if the retailers sell substitutes (complements), and this effect trickles up to the upstream supplier of the leveraged retailer under the parallel structure. Thus, the dedicated suppliers will abet the leveraged retailers to compete more aggressively than unleveraged ones. However, the common supplier is independent of their downstream customer's capital structure. These results reveal that the impacts of external credit on the supply chain profitability depend on the stages the supply chain members are in, the degree of product differentiation, the supply chain structure, the uncertainty of demand, and whether the competitor also has access to external credits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An ecosystem comprises all downstream products that employ a certain upstream input. In many cases, final consumers make irreversible investments to join an ecosystem before downstream prices are set. By committing to buy products that use the specific ecosystem input, they are at risk of being held‐up. Unable to observe future prices, consumers base their decisions on what they observe about the market structure within each ecosystem, including vertical contracts signed by the upstream firms. By entering into vertical agreements with multiple competing downstream firms, thus creating a credible expectation of lower prices, an upstream firm is able to mitigate consumers' hold‐up problem and, as a result, increase ecosystem demand. Our main observation is that, in contrast to conventional wisdom, an upstream monopolist merging with one of its downstream affiliates will find it profitable to continue to serve downstream competitors, even when products sold downstream are homogeneous. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We develop a theoretical economic model that establishes the link between fragmented patenting systems in an industry already characterized as a monopoly resulting in continuous/steady monopolistic market structure. We demonstrated that preemptive patenting strategy, by using secondary patenting scheme, may lead to an increase in the number of patents without changing actual number of products on the market. Moreover, when such a strategy is employed by a monopoly, it only serves to sustain and further monopolistic and therefore socially suboptimal market structure. Institutional/legal framework must exist to promote this kind of socially suboptimal behavior and resulting outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper incorporates reference‐dependent preferences into a consumption‐based asset pricing model featuring Epstein–Zin utility. Three relevant results emerge from this extension. First, agents prefer the late resolution of uncertainty in recursive utility. Second, the late resolution of uncertainty helps replicate the downward‐sloping term structure of market excess return. Third, the intertemporal substitution elasticity is more sensitive to asset prices through increasing precautionary saving motivations. A closed‐form solution for the proposed model largely explains (i) high, volatile, and countercyclical equity premiums; (ii) low risk‐free rates; and (iii) the downward‐sloping term structure of equity premiums and variance ratios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use a real‐option model to study the effect of input supplier's market power on a firm's capital structure, and identify the Nash equilibrium outcome (firm's investment and financing policies and its supplier's pricing policy). When its supplier has market power, the firm will reduce leverage ratio and delay investment. This can help explain why observed leverage ratios are lower than in traditional capital‐structure models (without supplier market power). Firm value can be increased by the vertical acquisition of the supplier, which would also result in a higher leverage ratio. This helps explain the observed increase in leverage ratios after acquisitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a theory of how market power affects wage inequality. We ask how goods and labor market power jointly determine the level of wages, the skill premium, and wage inequality. We then use detailed microdata from the U.S. Census Bureau between 1997 and 2016 to estimate the parameters of labor supply, technology, and the market structure. We find that a less competitive market structure lowers the average wage of high‐skilled workers by 11.3%, and of low‐skilled workers by 12.2%, contributes 8.1% to the rise in the skill premium, and accounts for 54.8% of the increase in between‐establishment wage variance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neil Fligstein's Conceptions of control have multiple theoretical origins in the institutional, political, and cultural perspectives of the new economic sociology. However, conceptions of control as a key concept of market structure have not systematically been formulated in Fligstein's works, remaining insightfully but relatively fragmentally. This paper summarizes the normative, power, and cognitive dimensions of conceptions of control, respectively corresponding to market agreement, dominant relationship and common understanding. On this basis, this paper provides a clear definition of conceptions of control. Additionally, this paper summarizes the formation of the conceptions of control and its change, distinguishes the differences between conceptions of control and other related concepts, and presents the evolution of the concept that has taken place in subsequent studies, as well as the criticisms to which it has been subjected. This paper suggests that this concept needs to be expanded in terms of the connotation of market actors, the role of government, and the forms of existence. Conceptions of control provide a concise conceptual tool for analyzing market transformation. We believe that the market changes triggered by the new business formats in the digital economy era will be more frequent, and conception of control will have a broader application prospect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The aim was to quantify changes in the market structure of primary care physicians and examine its relationship with access to care. Data Sources and Study Setting: We created measures of market structure from a 5% sample of Medicare fee‐for‐service claims and examined access to care using nationally representative data from the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS). Our study spanned from 2008 to 2019. Study Design: We used a linear probability model to estimate the relationship between access to care and two measures of market structure: concentration, measured by the Herfindahl–Hirschman Index (HHI), and vertical integration, measured by the market share of multispecialty firms. Our model controlled for year and ZIP code fixed effects, respondents' demographics and health status, and other measures of market structure. Data Collection/Extraction Methods: All adult respondents in the MEPS were included. Principal Findings: The percentage of people living in concentrated ZIP codes (HHI above 1500) increased from 37% in 2008 to 53% in 2019. During the same period, the median market share of multispecialty firms rose from 30% to 48%. Respondents in highly concentrated ZIP codes (HHI over 2500) were 5.9 percentage points (95% CI: −1.4 to −10.4) less likely to report having access to immediate care than respondents in unconcentrated ZIP codes. The association was largest among Medicaid beneficiaries, a 17.3 percentage point reduction (95% CI: −5.1 to −29.4). When we applied a model that was robust to biases from treatments with staggered timing, the estimated association remained negative but was not statistically significant. We found no association between HHI and indicators for having a usual source of care and annual checkups. The multispecialty market share was negatively associated with checkups, but not other measures of access. Conclusions: Increases in concentration may reduce some types of access to healthcare. These effects appear most pronounced among Medicaid beneficiaries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates hedging performance with respect to different market structures for energy‐related commodities, including West Texas Intermediate crude oil, Brent crude oil, Chinese crude oil, and Heating oil. Copula quantile regression functions and the generalized autoregressive conditionally heteroscedasticity model are combined to analyze the nonlinear impact of dependence and the heterogeneous impact of market structure changes on hedging performance. Results show that hedging performance presents nonlinearity and market structure changes have surprisingly strong heterogeneous effects on the quantile hedge ratio, where bearish and bullish have lower hedge ratios than normal markets, which is captured better by Clayton copula quantile regression. Additionally, the trend of hedging effectiveness over different market structures also shows an inverted U shape. After changing data frequency or the types of futures contracts, the conclusions remain the same. Our empirical findings imply that hedgers are supposed to adjust the hedging number of futures according to market structure changes to hedge price risk effectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the impact of mobile money account ownership on farmers' participation in farmer‐based organisations (FBOs), structured market and off‐farm work. Relying on recursive bivariate probit model, our results reveal that owning a mobile money account increases the likelihood of farmers' participating in an FBO, structured market and off‐farm work by 15.4%, 33.3% and 37.5%, respectively. Furthermore, mobile money account ownership is influenced by socioeconomic and institutional factors as well as the presence of mobile money vendors within a community. Our finding calls for sustained efforts to deepen digital financial inclusion for increased participation in FBOs, structured market and off‐farm work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a sample of Brazilian listed companies, our study investigates the directional cause–effect relationship between market structure, ESG performance, and firm efficiency under a Stochastic Structural Relationship Programming (SSRP) model. Our empirical evidence is threefold. First, our findings indicate that firms with better environmental performance are more efficient, whereas lower ESG performance and poorer corporate governance practices are associated with a higher level of efficiency. Second, our study suggests that market structure measures (i.e., competition, concentration, and market power) have heterogeneous impacts on various ESG indexes. Specifically, higher market competition is associated with a lower concentration, better ESG performance and environmental performance, but worse corporate governance performance, although market power can only enhance the environmental and governance performance of firms. Third, the market structure proxies employed in this study are significantly attributed to firm efficiency. Our findings provide practical implications for various stakeholders and suggest avenues for future studies that can build on our evidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We develop a monetary model in which a private company issues digital currency and uses payment data to estimate consumers' preferences. Sellers purchase preference information to produce goods that better match consumers' preferences. A monopoly arises in the digital currency industry, and digital currency is not issued if the inflation rate is sufficiently high. Due to reinforcing interactions between the value of preference information and trade volume, multiple equilibria (with and without digital currency) can exist, depending on market structures for monetary exchanges. When left to market forces alone, socially efficient uses of payment data may not occur. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We adopt a novel variation of the traditional structure‐conduct‐performance modelling approach, looking at between, rather than within, industries to study the impact of changes in the bank market structure on the corporate performance of financial technology (fintech) firms using firm‐level data. We use two samples, one with 231 fintech firms and one with 231 non‐fintech firms across 24 industrialized countries over the 10‐year period from 2008 to 2017. We find that changes in bank market power have a positive impact on the performance of fintech companies suggesting that such firms complement rather than compete with banks. On the other hand, within the non‐fintech sector, we find that changes in bank market power have no impact on non‐fintech firms. Our results are robust to several tests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite regulators' on‐going concerns on the high concentration of the current audit market, the effects of concentration on auditors' behavior is still debated. We provide an answer to this unresolved issue by considering the role of legal regime in shaping auditors' pricing strategy in a concentrated market. Using data from 33 countries, we find no significant association between audit market concentration and audit fees in the pooled international sample. However, a country's legal regime changes this association dramatically: the association is significantly positive in countries with a weak legal regime but becomes weaker and eventually turns negative as countries' legal regime becomes stronger. Our study highlights the importance of country‐level institutions in determining how market structure affects market participants' behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent extreme events and the disruptions they caused have made food supply chain resilience a key topic for researchers and policymakers. This paper provides input into these discussions by evaluating the efficiency and resilience properties of the leading policy proposals. We develop a conceptual model of a prototype agricultural supply chain, parameterize the model based on the empirical literature, and conduct simulations to assess the impacts on resilience and economic welfare of four key policy proposals: (i) intensified antitrust enforcement to improve market competition, (ii) subsidization of entry of additional processing capacity, (iii) prevention of price spikes through anti‐price‐gouging laws, and (iv) diversification of production and processing across multiple regions. Results show that some of the policies have potential to improve supply‐chain resilience, but their impacts depend on the existing market structure, and resilience gains often come at the cost of reduced efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate the relationship between internal corporate governance and market performance across multiple countries, utilizing a comprehensive data set comprising 77,440 firm observations from 15 European Union countries over the period 2002‐2018. Specifically, we examine the impact of board characteristics, including size, independence, gender diversity, CEO duality, and classified boards, on market performance. Our findings reveal that CEO duality is generally negatively related to returns, whereas independent directors and board diversity are positively related to market performance. We observe a positive association between staggered boards and market performance as well as Tobin's Q, aligning with the EU's emphasis on stakeholder investments. Upon analyzing the data at the country level, we identify that the links between board structure and performance vary by country, and there isn't a single variable that is consistently related to market returns or Tobin's Q. These divergent findings indicate that there is no universally applicable corporate governance solution that can be recommended for companies throughout Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extended producer responsibility (EPR) for packaging was introduced to achieve closed‐loop end‐of‐life management and design for recyclability and is an integral part of the European Union's (EU) environmental policy mix. Despite common objectives, EPR systems differ across EU member states in design and implementation. Existing cross‐country comparisons often fall short of systematizing EPR and reflecting its complexity. Understanding the components and interdependencies of EPR is crucial for adjusting policy design. This article links previously isolated components of EPR and studies the design, implementation, and transfer of EPR systems in 25 European countries through a developmental approach. It extends EPR theory by systematizing EPR design features at three hierarchical levels: system scope, responsibility allocation, and instrument type. It then tests the approach by systematically examining similarities and differences, including a uniform coding process and cluster analysis. My results indicate that EPR for plastic packaging is becoming increasingly fine‐grained and diverse. I show that "path‐dependencies" emerge between certain features at the responsibility allocation level. I also find common implementation patterns across countries revolving around, for example, EPR market structure or producer responsibility type. System scope converges across countries, while instrument types are becoming increasingly multi‐faceted. I find that policy transfer mechanisms, such as first‐mover dynamics and geographic proximity, have likely influenced existing landscapes of EPR design across the EU. These insights provide an intriguing first step toward deeper analysis of EPR design and, if further extended, can be operationalized for future ex ante or ex post policy analysis of EPR system setups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the determinants of the levels of forward contracting preferred by generators and buyers of electricity. Increased forward contracting systematically reduces the variance of a generator's profit, so a generator prefers higher levels of forward contracting as market uncertainty or its aversion to risk increases. In contrast, increased forward contracting can either increase or reduce the variance of a buyer's profit. Consequently, a buyer can prefer either reduced or increased levels of forward contracting as market uncertainty or its aversion to risk increases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We argue that the economies that achieved inclusive growth, or high sustained and broad‐based growth while keeping a lid on the increase in market income inequality, are characterised by dynamism—a drive towards the acquisition of new capabilities in sophisticated products and processes. What a country produces and how much it competes domestically and internationally are important for achieving fair and inclusive markets. We show empirical evidence that dynamism, as measured by export sophistication, reduces market income inequality and poverty while increasing a broad concept of welfare. We explore policy options to steer industrial and market structures towards raising dynamism, thus providing growth opportunities for both workers and firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers and practitioners globally, from a range of perspectives, acknowledge the difficulty in determining the value of a financial asset. This subject is of utmost importance due to the numerous participants involved and its impact on enhancing market structure, function, and efficiency. This paper conducts a comprehensive review of the academic literature to provide insights into the reasoning behind certain conventions adopted in financial value estimation, including the implementation of preprocessing techniques, the selection of relevant inputs, and the assessment of the performance of computational models in predicting asset prices over time. Our analysis, based on 109 studies sourced from 10 databases, reveals that daily forecasts have achieved average error rates of less than 1.5%, while monthly data only attain this level in optimal circumstances. We also discuss the utilization of tools and the integration of hybrid models. Finally, we highlight compelling gaps in the literature that provide avenues for further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A global transition towards diets increasingly dominated by ultra‐processed foods (UPFs) has occurred in recent decades to the detriment of public health and the environment. This study aimed to examine long‐term trends in the structure and market dynamics of the global UPF manufacturing industry as part of broader efforts to understand the drivers of this transition. Using diverse methods, metrics and data sources, we examined several dimensions (e.g., industry concentration and profitability) according to an adapted structure–conduct–performance model. We found that the global UPF manufacturing industry has evolved to become a major component of global food systems, with its longstanding dominant corporations becoming some of the system's largest accumulators of profit and distributors of capital. It follows that reversing the global UPF dietary transition will require structural and regulatory changes to ensure that population diets, and food systems more broadly, are not subordinated to the interests of powerful for‐profit business corporations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using data for Italy from 1994 to 2015, we appraise the nexus between Basel II and III accords and both the cost and the profit inefficiency of profit‐oriented and mutual cooperative banks. Our analysis further deals with the effects of the regulation in different market structures. To assess the efficiency of the two types of banks under scrutiny, a stochastic frontier approach has been proposed. The evidence reported in this paper indicates that the regulatory framework of the Basel accords had heterogeneous effects on the efficiency of Italian banking institutions. Specifically, Basel II is associated with a contraction in the profit inefficiency and an increase in the cost inefficiency for mutual cooperative banks. On the other hand, Basel III worsened the profit inefficiency, though it is found to reduce the profit inefficiency of mutual cooperative banks, with no significant impact on cost inefficiency. Furthermore, once we control for the degree of market competition, the effects of the regulation are shown to be statistically insignificant. The advent of the 2008 recession and the application of the revenue inefficiency do not alter the main findings. There is also some evidence of spatial effects of the Basel II regulation at the LMA level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Countries differ, sometimes significantly, regarding their basic labour market structure. Despite the prevalence of theoretical literature, empirical studies examining the impact of labour market rigidity (LMR) on trade is sparse. Existing empirical studies have been limited to aggregate trade flows with cross‐sectional estimations; a limited set of countries (e.g. OECD or Latin America) or to the period after 1990. We utilise a gravity model of trade to examine the impact of LMR on exports for 145 countries between 1964 and 2004. We utilise dis‐aggregated product‐level trade data and decompose total exports into the extensive and the intensive margin to examine this relationship. We also utilise total aggregate international trade relative to domestic sales, which allows for the identification of LMR‐trade relationship, even in the presence of multilateral trade resistance controls. Finally, we estimate the effect of LMR on exports (and the margins) by focusing on a sample of European OECD countries via the difference‐in‐differences estimation. In all cases, we find that a rigid LMR reduces total exports, and this decrease is driven primarily by the intensive margin. Our findings are relevant as recent studies have found the intensive margin to be more important for long‐run export growth and especially for developing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper revisits horizontal mergers in an international oligopoly with differentiated goods under the segmented market assumption. In particular, we focus on an industry composed of firms that engage in their Kantian optimization. Strikingly from the case of each firm's Nashian optimization, we show that a duopoly with two international mergers can be uniquely observed in equilibrium except for a full monopoly, and the highest total social welfare can be achieved in its equilibrium market structure. In addition, we consider the managerial delegation cases from the viewpoints of two types of each firm's Kantian optimization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The elasticities of substitution between marketing and farm inputs are important for modeling the shape of derived demand and understanding the market structure in the food market. Wohlgenant develops a theoretical framework and finds significant substitution between marketing and farm inputs. The estimates in Wohlgenant have been widely used in economic studies on the US food market, and in this paper, we replicate the results, perform robustness checks, and update the estimates using recent data. Despite minor discrepancies, we are able to replicate most of the results in Wohlgenant and maintain robust estimates when we apply ridge regression. Using updated data, we calculate new estimates of the elasticities and find that marketing firms have become less competitive. We discuss important market trends in recent years and highlight potential venues for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate the effect of limited liability on firm investment. We find firms that intend to borrow but have higher risk have a greater probability of changing to limited liability. With propensity score matching, difference‐in‐differences analysis, and switching regressions with an endogenous switching model, we find that, after the liability regime change, firm investment aggressiveness decreases but on a lesser level than the over‐time change for firms using unlimited liability. We also find there is improvement in investment efficiency and return on invested capital. These results suggest that limited liability encourages firm investment and leads to more effective investment policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the degree of market power in the Syrian banking sector over the period 2005–2016 where research on competitive conditions does not exist. The degree of competitiveness is assessed based on the revenue elasticity to input prices approach and is related to a set of market indicators. To test whether the Syrian crisis has altered the competitive conditions over the years of the sample, I divide the full sample into two subsamples, namely the pre‐crisis years (2005–2012) and the crisis years (2013–2016). The results suggest that banks in Syria earn their interest and total revenue under conditions of monopoly. I find that the trend of market structure—characterized by a monopoly—in the pre‐crisis years continues over crisis years. My findings provide robust evidence that a collusive behaviour among banks is in operation in the banking sector of Syria. The difficult penetration into/exit from the market has led to the existence of a profit‐curb mechanism for the Syrian banks, hence, an upward shift in the marginal cost curve will be associated with a reduction in revenue as a result of the optimal condition for these banks which act as monopolists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate investment incentives in credence corporate social responsibility under different market structures. In duopoly, for high enough investment transparency (IT), exactly one firm invests in the clean technology: They differentiate their products. If the firms merge, with high enough IT and product traceability, the monopolist also invests in (only) one plant, but the necessary IT for investment is higher. Without product traceability, whenever the monopolist invests, it is in both plants, but the IT required for investment is even higher. We conclude that "green" competition policy must be nuanced, taking into account (or regulating) both transparency and traceability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In India, inclusivity in education can be seen as an expression of commitment to social justice. It reflects a deep commitment to the goals of universalisation of education promoted by world agencies such as UNESCO. However, pitched between the aspirational goals of achieving equity and social justice on one hand, and the economic imperative of a competitive market on the other, inclusivity in education seems an ever‐elusive goal. Students' voices and all the cultural and experiential resources they hold, are marginalised in school, contributing to alienating students from school learning. The study on which this article reports sought to support teachers glean insights from participation in a purposive modelling activity, set in a Vygotskian dialectic frame of reference. The activity focused on how learning from students and their communities can be harnessed to engage students ontologically in class, to enhance students' agentive role in an inclusive learning environment. It is rooted in a funds of knowledge approach. The qualitative data for this ethnographically oriented study have been gathered from multiple sources over 2 years and analysed thematically. The findings show that modelling not only helped teacher learning and development of practice, but also familiarised teachers with issues of equity and inclusivity. Notably, by making teachers aware of the differentiated needs of all the students in the process of invoking their unique contribution to learning from their cultural locations. The insights are used to discuss the challenges posed for teachers in making their new learning part of their teaching practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the reallocator of liquidity from banks with excess to banks with a deficit, the interbank money market (IMM) plays a fundamental role in the proper functioning of the banking system and the economy as a whole. The aggregate uncertainty derived from stochasticity of the overall level of the demand for short-term liquidity and the likelihood of domino failures of tightly connected competitors who lend themselves vast amounts of liquidity explains the complexity of decisions in this environment. To identify the most significant factors influencing actors' strategies, we first present the five underlying patterns discovered through a bibliometric analysis of 609 scientific documents in this field: contagion and systemic risk, stability, market structure, relationship and trust, and default and failure. Then, our detailed study findings on 160 recent works indicate elements that affect central banks' strategies in reducing systemic risk and preventing financial contagion, as well as managing the interbank network in a way that makes it more stable and resilient to shocks to conserve market confidence. Furthermore, they address factors that influence banks' strategies to maintain their lending relationships and mitigate default risk. In addition to summarizing potential research directions, this paper provides market participants with a strategy fact-sheet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We apply the interest rate model of Chen, Hsieh, and Huang (CHH), the CHH model, to explore the implied volatility (IV) term structure's predictive power for bond excess returns. The CHH model has two advantages over existing models: (1) it delivers the IV of the interest rate, rather than the volatility of the swap rate on which the conventional swaption pricing model is built, and (2) the CHH model systematically summarizes 100 swaption prices into a volatility term structure with 10 succinct IVs. By exploiting these advantages, we demonstrate the IV term structure's predictive power and its connection to economic conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is theoretical and managerial significant to explore the determinants of retailers' decisions between a combined price structure and a partitioned price structure and the effect of their decisions on a manufacturer's product sales in competitive markets. Based on the structure–conduct–performance framework, we reveal that market structure‐related characteristics, such as the number of retailers, the degree of retailer differentiation, whether a dominant retailer in the market, and the number of product substitutes, significantly affect retailers' price structure decisions. Furthermore, more retailers adopting a combined price structure decrease the product sales, although the size of retailers mitigates this effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a factor timing strategy with information from 146 characteristic‐based factors and a deep learning approach to capture the nonlinear predictability. The deep learning‐based factor timing strategy generates the highest economic value compared with the unconditional and alternative linear machine learning‐based portfolios and remains robust after controlling for traditional factor models and transaction costs. With the unique market structure of the Chinese stock market, we find that mispricing‐based theory helps explain the factor timing via deep learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article develops a model in which market structure is determined endogenously by the choice of intermediation mode. There are two representative modes of intermediation that are widely used in real‐life markets: one is a middleman mode where an intermediary purchases inventory from the wholesale market and resells to buyers; the other is a market‐making mode where an intermediary offers a platform for buyers and sellers to meet and trade. We show that a marketmaking middleman, who adopts a mixture of these two intermediation modes, can emerge in a directed search equilibrium and discuss implications for the market structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We assess how firms' incentives to operate and invest in energy storage depend on the market structure. For this purpose, we characterize equilibrium market outcomes allowing for market power in storage and/or production, as well as for vertical integration between storage and production. Market power reduces overall efficiency through two channels: It induces an inefficient use of the storage facilities, and it distorts investment incentives. The worst outcome for consumers and total welfare occurs under vertical integration. The results are key to understanding how to regulate energy storage, an issue which is critical for the deployment of renewable energies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We compare welfare‐increasing and consumer‐surplus‐increasing merger policies in an oligopoly when merging firms face endogenous trade policies, and engage in cost‐reducing R&D activity. As R&D becomes less efficient, the equilibrium market structures (EMS) become less concentrated under both merger policies. When R&D is very efficient, monopoly becomes the EMS under the welfare‐increasing merger policy. This occurs as the absence of tariff and efficient R&D under monopoly limit the price increase and the gain in profits outweighs the loss in consumer surplus and tariff revenue. The results suggest that trade policies should take into account merger policies and industries' R&D efficiency. The results also show that global welfare maximization requires global merger policy coordination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Existing studies on partial ownership usually overlook the effects of vertically related markets. Our paper highlights the importance of the upstream market on downstream firms' incentives to acquire partial ownership and the consequent welfare implications. In the main model, we assume that there are three firms in the downstream market, two of which may form a partial ownership arrangement. We find several results that are in contrast to those in the literature. First, the two firms will engage in partial ownership if the upstream market is an oligopoly (triopoly or duopoly). Second, partial ownership may raise total production, consumer surplus, and social welfare. This happens when the upstream market consists of a duopoly and the two firms involved in partial ownership are supplied by different suppliers. Third, the outsider, commonly known as a free rider in the literature, may become a victim of partial ownership. Our results are robust to several extensions, including a general n $n$‐firm framework, product differentiation, and uniform pricing by upstream firms. We also provide the conditions under which the curvature of the demand function and the convexity of the cost function motivate firms to form partial ownership. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the impact of the strategic use of debt financing as a commitment device, in a vertically differentiated duopoly with demand uncertainty. We consider various possible game sequences for two firms with asymmetric financial structures to enter the market. The results show that (i) having access to external debt does not necessarily promote the firm to provide a higher quality product; (ii) strategic debt improves the degree of product differentiation and benefits both firms; and (iii) a firm's optimal debt level is positively related to the first‐mover advantage of introducing its product to the market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates in which way sustainable entrepreneurship can generate institutional change that transforms markets towards sustainability. A transformation of models of economic organization and market structures through sustainable entrepreneurship fosters the path towards sustainability. Institutional change involves sustainable market entrepreneurs as institutional entrepreneurs that operate in an effectual manner in different market transformation phases. Sustainable market entrepreneurs while seeking entrepreneurial opportunities simultaneously shape existing market structures and market conditions in different sustainable market transformation phases thereby creating new opportunities. Accordingly, a framework that explains institutional change prompted by sustainable market entrepreneurs in market transformation phases is developed. In this framework, various interventions which encourage sustainable market entrepreneurs to co‐create with the stakeholders of their choice are strategized. The provided framework enhances the understanding of the versatile role of sustainable market entrepreneurs and potentially the leverage of their actions towards institutional impact over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the effects of a public uniform R&D subsidy policy in a downstream duopoly market in which a nonintegrated firm, which faces a lower marginal cost, outsources inputs from its vertically integrated rival. The findings show that, in this market structure, such a policy has relevant effects largely differentiated between downstream competitors, as it can significantly modify the relative market shares and profitability of competing firms. Unlike the standard Cournot setting augmented with R&D, results show that the subsidy policy can have different (counterintuitive) effects on R&D investments, output, and profits of the vertically integrated producer and the vertically separated firm, which hold in both cases of exogenous and endogenous (optimal) subsidy. Our findings offer some testable implications and suggest that a subsidy policy in a market with outsourcing to a rival should also consider the different effects of this approach on competitors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Entrepreneurship induces novelty in the innovation system, generates selection processes, and shapes market structure over time. Entrepreneurial firms participate in the creation and diffusion of new technologies, the creation, and early development of new markets and industries, and the renewal of existing firms and industries. But does entrepreneurship also facilitate the transformation and adaptability of innovation systems? In this paper, we analyze whether the Swedish innovation system's industrial structure underwent a transformation as a result of the emergence, growth, and development of new entrepreneurial firms during the last financial crisis. In particular, we focus on the dynamics of two relevant sectors of the Swedish economy which, however, show however different structural characteristics: manufacture of machinery and industrial equipment, and computer programming. Our analysis reveals that large companies use firm acquisitions to respond to the threats posed by new emerging entrepreneurial firms. In the current context of disruptive change, acquisitions are thus used as a defensive mechanism for firms' survival and adaptation rather than as a means to transfer/gain new knowledge/technology. We discuss how entrepreneurial ecosystems and innovation support policies can take two forms depending on the stage of development of an innovation system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we investigate different market structures where decision makers are incentivized by both profit and revenue. Our innovation is that we consider managers that evaluate revenue in a non‐linear way, exhibiting diminishing marginal utility. This implies that incremental changes in revenue—for example, due to demand shocks—generate production choices that depend on the existing revenue base of the firm. We show that this intuitively appealing extension reverses some conventional results: decision makers may increase output in the presence of negative demand shocks, which depends on the concavity of their utility function with respect to revenue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a model to describe the link between industrial structure and evasion dynamics in a heterogeneous setting, in which the monitoring efforts put in place by the State to fight evasion of firms depend on the market share of each firm. More precisely, while the convenience to evade taxes is determined as a Nash solution of an incomplete information game, a differentiated monitoring activity related to market concentration represents the original contribution of this work w.r.t. previous studies on the topic. As empirical evidence shows, high dimensional firms are more likely to be monitored, hence, when dynamics are considered, evasion and industrial structure evolution are strictly related. In fact, by combining analytical findings and simulation results, our work shows that: (1) firms with a sufficiently large market share, that is, larger than a certain dimensional threshold, comply with fiscal rules, thus confirming empirical evidence; (2) this dimensional threshold changes with the competition level between firms in a nonlinear way; (3) evasion affects the market structure, so that markets with high (low) competition tend to increase (decrease) their concentration over time; (4) evasion is affected by market structure and is minimum in moderately concentrated markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]