Strategic Reneging and Market Power in Sequential Markets.

This article investigates the incentives for firms with market power to manipulate markets by strategically reneging on forward commitments. We first study the behavior of a dominant firm in a two‐period model with demand uncertainty. We then use the model's predictions and a machine learning approa...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Publicado en:RAND Journal of Economics (Wiley-Blackwell) Vol. 56; no. 1; pp. 3 - 35
Autores principales: Benatia, David, de Villemeur, Étienne Billette
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Wiley-Blackwell Spring2025
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Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
Descripción
Sumario:This article investigates the incentives for firms with market power to manipulate markets by strategically reneging on forward commitments. We first study the behavior of a dominant firm in a two‐period model with demand uncertainty. We then use the model's predictions and a machine learning approach to investigate multiple occurrences of reneging on long‐term commitments in Alberta's electricity market in 2010–2011. We find that a supplier significantly increased its revenues by strategically reneging on its capacity availability obligations, causing Alberta's annual electricity procurement costs to increase by as much as $600 million (+17%).