Countervailing Power and Price Transparency.

We investigate whether increased transparency about prices may increase the countervailing power exercised by buyers of an intermediate good and whether this will lead to a decrease of intermediate goods prices. We show that, even in a non-cooperative, one-shot model, the most likely outcome of improved transparency is a price increase: Improved transparency will lead sellers to take tougher bargaining stands since more is at stake. The results are related to the experience of the Danish Competition Authority´s practice in the 1990s.