Leniency programs reduce sanctions for law violators that self-report. We focus on their ability to deter cartels and organized crime by increasing incentives to "cheat" on partners. Optimally designed "courageous" leniency programs reward the first party that reports with the fines paid by all...

This paper shows how competing firms can facilitate tacit collusion by making passive investments in rivals. When firms are identical, only multilateral partial cross ownership (PCO) facilitates tacit collusion; the incentives of firms to collude in this case depend in a comlex way on the whole...

This article investigates how antitrust agencies should structure the disclosing of information about efficiency gains from interested parties (merging firms, and competitors) in merger control. We analyze the particular case of a horizontal merger with danger of foreclosure, where welfare can...

This paper considers the possibility that a seller can contract with one uninformed buyer prior to an auction involving two potential buyers. In a more general setting than previous literature, strategic ex-ante contracts not only extract rent from entrants, but could also mitigate the...

In this paper, an infinitely-repeated Bertrand game is considered. The model has a two-tier relationship; two firms make a self-enforced collusive agreement and each firm writes a law-enforced contract to its privately-informed agent. The main finding is that in optimal collusion, interaction...

This paper uses household-level data of cellular usage to provide estimates of the implied switching costs that preclude consumers from switching providers in the face of competing offers. Our estimation differs from previous switching costs studies in that we are able to observe individual...

Strong seasonality in demand, a short product life cycle, and the absence of any price competition make the release date of first-run movies one of the main strategic decisions taken by movies' distributors. Movies are typically released on a Friday within a short release season, thus making the...

This paper reports a laboratory experiment to study pricing and advertising behavior in a market with costly buyer search. Sellers simultaneously post prices and decide whether or not to incur an exogenous cost to advertise their price. Sellers are not capacity constrained, and each buyer...

Through altering competitive conditions, globalisation can have a significant impact on productivity of the domestic economy. Foreign competition can stimulate the productivity improvements by domestic firms or it can lead to the elimination of inefficient producers. Alternatively, the threat or...

In this paper, we discuss the possibility of strategic behavior and truthful reporting in a two players' announcement game when there is a cost for getting information. First we show that the best strategy of each player is to announce the observed signal truthfully if the announcement is made...