This introductory essay briefly summarizes the eleven empirical studies of price setting and price adjustment that are included in this special issue. The studies, which use data from several European countries, were conducted as part of the European Central Bank's Inflation Persistence Network.

We study price dynamics for computer components sold on a price-comparison website. Our fine-grained data - a year of hourly price data for scores of rival retailers - allow us to estimate a dynamic model of competition, backing out structural estimates of managerial frictions. The estimated...

Standard theories of price adjustment are based on the problem of a single-product firm, and therefore they may not be well suited to analyze price dynamics in the economy with multiproduct firms. To guide new theory, we study a unique dataset with comprehensive coverage of daily prices in large...

How should firms optimally choose prices and promotional strategies and how should they position their products when consumers are "relative thinkers"? We provide answers in a model that extends the seminal contributions of Varian (1980) and Narasimhan (1988) and derive both managerial...

We study price dynamics for computer components sold on a price-comparison website. Our fine-grained data -- a year of hourly price data for scores of rival retailers -- allow us to estimate a dynamic model of competition, backing out structural estimates of managerial frictions. The estimated...

Analyzing price data from sequential German electricity markets, namely the day-ahead and intraday auction, a puzzling but apparently systematic pattern of price premiums can be identified. The price premiums are highly correlated with the underlying demand profile. As there is evidence that...

Pricing strategies may include the advertising of meeting-the-competition clauses (MCCs). We show in a specific spatial model scenario with differently informed consumers that MCCs primarily serve as a device to facilitate collusion instead of allowing for price discrimination between these...

We study competition among a score of firms participating in an online market for a commodity-type memory module. Firms were able to adjust prices continuously; prices determined how the firms were ranked and listed (lowest price listed first), with better ranks contributing to firms' sales....

In many markets, sellers advertise their good with an asking price. This is a price at which the seller is willing to take his good off the market and trade immediately, though it is understood that a buyer can submit an offer below the asking price and that this offer may be accepted if the...

We study competition among a score of firms participating in an online market for a commodity computer component. Firms were able to adjust prices continuously; prices determined how the firms were ranked and listed (lowest price listed first), with better ranks contributing to firms' sales....