Publication database

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Price concentration studies investigate the relationship between market concentration and price levels. They are increasingly used in the mobile telecom industry. This paper provides a detailed account of the limitations of such studies. In addition, it proposes a specific approach in order to account for quality differences across countries, which are likely important when explaining price differences. When applying our approach to European mobile telecom markets from 2003 to 2012, we find that there is no positive relationship between concentration and prices and some indications that the relationship may be negative.

This paper studies the interplay between the operational and financial facets of capacity investment. We consider the capacity choice problem of a firm with limited liquidity and whose access to external capital markets is hampered by moral hazard. The firm must therefore not only calibrate its capacity investment and the corresponding funding needs, but also optimize its sourcing of funds. Importantly, the set of available sources of funds is derived endogenously and includes standard financial claims (debt, equity, etc.). We find that when higher demand realizations are more indicative of high effort, debt financing is optimal for any given capacity level. In this case, the optimal capacity is never below the efficient capacity level but sometimes strictly above that level. Further, the optimal capacity level increases with the moral hazard problem's severity and decreases with the firm's internal funds. This runs counter to the newsvendor logic and to the common intuition that by raising the cost of external capital and hence the unit capacity cost, financial market frictions should lower the optimal capacity level. We trace the value of increasing capacity beyond the efficient level to a bonus effect and a demand elicitation effect. Both stem from the risk of unmet demand, which is characteristic of capacity decisions under uncertainty.

This paper analyzes the effect of the removal of government guarantees on bank risk taking. We exploit the removal of guarantees for German Landesbanken which results in lower credit ratings, higher funding costs, and a loss in franchise value. This removal was announced in 2001, but Landesbanken were allowed to issue guaranteed bonds until 2005. We find that Landesbanken lend to riskier borrowers after 2001. This effect is most pronounced for Landesbanken with the highest expected decrease in franchise value. Landesbanken also significantly increased their off-balance sheet exposure to the global ABCP market. Our results provide implications for the debate on how to remove guarantees.