Feedback mechanisms that allow partners to rate each other after a transaction are considered crucial for the success of anonymous internet trading platforms. We document an asymmetry in the feedback behavior on eBay, propose an explanation based on the micro structure of the feedback mechanism...

The aim of this paper is to describe in detail a set of newly developed indicators of the quality of competition policy, Competition Policy Indexes, or CPIs. The CPIs measure the deterrence properties of a competition policy in a jurisdiction, where for competition policy we mean the antitrust...

Forthcoming in the Journal of Public Economics. We study the consequences of leniency - reduced legal sanctions for wrongdoers who spontaneously self-report to law enforcers - on sequential, bilateral, illegal transactions, such as corruption, manager-auditor collusion, or drug deals. It is...

eBay's feedback mechanism is considered crucial to establishing and maintaining trust on the world's largest trading platform. The effects of a user's reputation on the probability of sale and on prices are at the center of a large number of studies. More recent theoretical work considers...

When granting credit, banks depend on reliable information about the creditworthiness and risk structure of potential borrowers. This information is typically gathered by national credit bureaus. Nationally established banks depend on information from credit bureaus more than ever, particularly...

Banken sind bei der Kreditvergabe auf verlässliche Informationen über die Bonität und Risikostruktur potentieller Kreditnehmer angewiesen. Diese Informationen werden in der Regel von nationalen Kreditauskunfteien gesammelt. Insbesondere beim Eintritt in einen ausländischen Markt sind eher...

This paper shows that as long as the stock market has perfect foresight, some dividends are distributed, and incentives are paid more than once or are deferred, stock-related compensation packages are strong incentives for managers to support tacit collusive agreements in repeated oligopolies....

The paper proposes a theory of the anti-competitive effects of debt finance based on the interaction between capital structure, managerial incentives, and firms' ability to sustain collusive agreements. It shows that shareholders' commitments that reduce conflicts with debtholders such as hiring...

Why do money and markets crowd out co-operative relations? This paper characterises the effects of intertemporal preferences, money, and markets on players' ability to co-operate in material-payoff supergames. Players' aversion to intertemporal substitution facilitates co-operation by decreasing...