The purpose of this Paper is to study the determinants of the concentration of ownership in a privatized, regulated firm. The discussion illustrates some aspects of the costs and benefits of different corporate systems. Privatized utilities are large firms with professional management: there is...

When data on actual choices are not available, researchers studying preferences sometimes pose choice scenarios and ask respondents to state the actions they would choose if they were to face these scenarios. The data on stated choices are then used to estimate random utility models, as if they...

The EU faces challenges in reforming the Gas and Electricity Directives to implement the single market in electricity and gas. The Paper argues that there is unfinished business in the areas of regulation, restructuring, encouraging proper risk management through contracting, and designing...

We show how size-contingent laws can be used to identify the equilibrium and welfare effects of labor regulation. Our framework incorporates such regulations into the Lucas (1978) model and applies this to France where many labor laws start to bind on firms with exactly 50 or more employees....

In some markets vertically integrated firms sell directly to final customers but also to independent downstream firms with whom they then compete on the downstream market. It is often argued that resellers intensify competition and benefit consumers, in particular when wholesale prices are...

The Spanish electricity spot market is highly concentrated both on the seller and the buyer side. Furthermore, unlike electricity spot markets in other deregulated electricity systems, large buyers and sellers are typically vertically integrated. This allows both large net sellers and large net...

Several regulatory authorities worldwide have recently imposed forward contract obligations on electricity producers as a way to mitigate their market power. In this paper we investigate how such contractual obligations affect equilibrium bidding in electricity markets, or in any other...

We examine whether and how the allocation of financial transmission rights affects the behavior of electricity generators and electricity consumers with market power in the electricity market. The analysis recognizes that the ultimate allocation of rights is endogenous, depending both on whether...

We examine whether and how the allocation of physical rights to utilize congested transmission links affects the behavior of electricity generators and electricity consumers with market power in the electricity market. The paper extends the analysis of financial transmission rights contained in...

Starting in 1998, the electricity market in England and Wales will be opened up to full competition, and all consumers will be allowed to choose their electricity supplier. This promises to result in lower prices, but there will be additional transactions costs exceeding £100 million a year for...