Showing papers on "Limit price published in 2012"

The Price Impact of Order Book Events

Abstract: We study the price impact of order book events - limit orders, market orders and cancelations - using the NYSE TAQ data for 50 U.S. stocks. We show that, over short time intervals, price changes are mainly driven by the order flow imbalance, defined as the imbalance between supply and demand at the best bid and ask prices. Our study reveals a linear relation between order flow imbalance and price changes, with a slope inversely proportional to the market depth. These results are shown to be robust to intraday seasonality effects, and stable across time scales and across stocks. This linear price impact model, together with a scaling argument, implies the empirically observed "square-root" relation between the magnitude of price moves and trading volume. However, the latter relation is found to be noisy and less robust than the one based on order flow imbalance. We discuss a potential application of order flow imbalance as a measure of adverse selection in limit order executions, and demonstrate how it can be used to analyze intraday volatility dynamics.

Online and Offline Demand and Price Elasticities: Evidence from the Air Travel Industry

Abstract: The Internet has brought consumers increased access to information to make purchase decisions. One of the expected consequences is an increase in the price elasticity of demand, or the percent change in demand caused by a percent change in price, because consumers are better able to compare offerings from multiple suppliers. In this paper, we analyze the impact of the Internet on demand, by comparing the demand functions in the Internet and traditional air travel channels. We use a data set that contains information for millions of records of airline ticket sales in both online and offline channels. The results suggest that consumer demand in the Internet channel is more price elastic for both transparent and opaque online travel agencies (OTAs), in part, because of more leisure travelers self-selecting the online channel, relative to business travelers. Yet, after controlling for this channel self-selection effect, we still find differences in price elasticity across channels. We find that the opaque OTAs are more price elastic than the transparent OTAs, which suggests that product information can mitigate the price pressures that arise from Internet-enabled price comparisons. We discuss the broader implications for multichannel pricing strategy and for the transparency-based design of online selling mechanisms.

Pharmaceutical Prices under Regulation: Tiered Co-payments and Reference Pricing in Germany

Abstract: Many countries with national health care providers and health insurances regulate the market for pharmaceuticals to steer drug demand and to control expenses. For example, they introduce reference pricing or tiered co-payments to enhance drug substitution and competition. Since 2006, Germany follows an innovative approach by differentiating drug co-payments by the drug's price relative to its reference price. In this two-tier system, prescription drugs are completely exempted from co-payments if their prices undercut a certain price level relative to the reference price. We identify the effect of the policy on the prices of all affected prescription drugs and differentiate the analysis by firm types (innovative, generic, branded generic or importing firms). To identify a causal effect, we use a differences-in-differences approach and additionally exploit the fact that the exemption policy had been introduced successively in the different clusters. We use quarterly data from 2007 to 2010 and find empirical evidence for differentiated price setting strategies by firm types, ranging from price decreases of -13.1% (branded generics firms) to increases of +2.0% (innovators) following the introduction of potential reductions in co-payments. We refer to the latter result as the co-payment exemption paradox. Our competition proxy (no. of firms) suggests a significant but small negative correlation with prices.

Lost in Transit: Product Replacement Bias and Pricing to Market †

Abstract: In the microdata underlying US trade price indexes, 40 percent of products are replaced before a single price change is observed and 70 percent are replaced after two price changes or fewer. A price index that focuses on price changes for identical items may, therefore, miss an important component of price adjustment occurring at the time of product replacements. We provide a model of this “product replacement bias” and quantify its importance using US data. Accounting for product replacement bias, long-run exchange rate “pass-through” is substantially higher than conventional estimates suggest, and the terms of trade are substantially more volatile. (JEL F14, F31) Despite large swings in the US dollar nominal exchange rate, US import and export prices appear remarkably stable in US dollar terms. Conventional measures of aggregate exchange rate “pass-through” imply that a 1 percent depreciation of the dollar leads to roughly a 0.2–0.4 percent long-run increase in nonoil import prices, and roughly a 0.1 percent long-run fall in export prices in US dollar terms (Campa and Goldberg 2005; Marazzi and Sheets 2007; Gopinath, Itskhoki, and Rigobon 2010). As a consequence, the ratio of export to import prices—the terms of trade—are much less volatile than the exchange rate. Low pass-through of exchange rates into aggregate price indexes persists at long horizons, despite highly persistent exchange rate movements, implying that it cannot be explained as a mechanical consequence of temporarily rigid prices alone. 1 We argue, however, that conventional measures of exchange rate pass-through based on aggregate price indexes are seriously biased—both in the short run and in the long run—due to two pervasive features of the underlying micro-data: highly

The Effects of Gasoline Price Regulations: Experimental Evidence

Abstract: Petrol prices tend to be subject to regular changes, often changing more than once a day in many countries, and the number of changes appears to increase For example, a recent sector inquiry by Germany’s competition authority has found that the number of price changes has almost tripled between 2007 and 2010 At the same time, economic theory suggests that gasoline retail markets are prone to collusive behavior Oligopoly market structures prevail, market interactions occur frequently, prices are highly transparent, and demand is rather inelastic As a result, a public debate has emerged whether or not to adopt regulatory pricing rules for gas stations similar to those implemented in Austria, parts of Australia, Luxembourg or parts of Canada In order to increase consumer welfare these rules either restrict the number of price changes per day or they limit the mark-up for gasoline retail prices As theoretical predictions about the impact of these measures are mixed and empirical studies rare, we analyze the effects, using an experimental gasoline market in the lab Our results reveal that two of the suggested rules rather decrease consumer welfare: The Austrian rule which only allows one price increase per day (while price cuts are always possible) and the Luxembourg rule which introduces a maximum markup for retailers While no rule tends to induce lower retail prices, the Western Australian rule which allows at most one daily price change (no matter whether up or down) does at least not harm consumers

Does Price Elasticity Vary with Economic Growth? A Cross-category Analysis

Abstract: How does price sensitivity change with the macroeconomic environment? We explore this question by measuring price elasticity using household-level data across 19 grocery categories over 24 quarters. For each category, we estimate a separate random-coefficients logit model with quarter-specific price response parameters, and control functions to address endogeneity. Our specification yields a novel set of 456 elasticities across categories and time that we generated using the same method and therefore can directly compare them. On average, price sensitivity is counter-cyclical — it rises when the macroeconomy weakens. However, substantial variation exists, and a handful of categories exhibit procyclical price sensitivity. We show the relationship between price sensitivity and macroeconomic growth correlates strongly with the average level of price sensitivity in a category. We examine several explanations for this result and conclude a category’s share-of-wallet is the more likely driver versus alternative explanations based on product perishability, substitution across consumption channels, or market power.

Price–quality relationship in the presence of asymmetric dynamic reference quality effects

Abstract: The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between price and reference quality and their combined effect on profits. An analytical modeling approach aimed at solving the optimal solution for the profit maximization problem under these conditions is developed, enabling the exact path of the optimal price and quality over time to be depicted. Based on separating the effects of price and reference quality on demand, this analysis also provides insight into the contribution of these two effects to the steady-state solution through elasticities. Our results show that a monotonic inverse relationship exists between price and quality, such that a steady-state level is obtained where the quality–price ratio is lower when reference quality effects exist than when such effects do not exist. In other words, consumers obtain higher quality for a higher price but with a lower price per unit of quality. Overall, accounting for reference quality effects will increase a firm’s profits.

The Discovery of Price Responsiveness – A Survey of Experiments Involving Dynamic Pricing of Electricity

Abstract: This paper surveys the results from 126 pricing experiments with dynamic pricing and time-of-use pricing of electricity. These experiments have been carried out across three continents at various times during the past decade. Data from 74 of these experiments are sufficiently complete to allow us to identify the relationship between the strength of the peak to off-peak price ratio and the associated reduction in peak demand or demand response. An “arc of price responsiveness” emerges from our analysis, showing that the amount of demand response rises with the price ratio but at a decreasing rate. We also find that about half of the variation in demand response can be explained by variations in the price ratio. This is a remarkable result, since the experiments vary in many other respects – climate, time period, the length of the peak period, the history of pricing innovation in each area, and the manner in which the dynamic pricing designs were marketed to customers. We also find that enabling technologies such as in-home displays, energy orbs and programmable and communicating thermostats boost the amount of demand response. The results of the paper support the case for widespread rollout of dynamic pricing and time-of-use pricing.

The Benefit of Uniform Price for Branded Variants

Abstract: The extensive adoption of uniform pricing for branded variants is a puzzling phenomenon, considering that firms may improve profitability through price discrimination. In the paper, we incorporate consumers' concerns of peer-induced price fairness into a model of price competition and show that uniform price for branded variants may emerge in equilibrium. Interestingly, we find that uniform pricing induced by consumers’ concerns of fairness can actually help mitigate price competition and hence increase firms’ profits if the demand of the product category is expandable. Furthermore, an individual firm may not have incentive to unilaterally mitigate consumers’ concerns of price fairness to its own branded variants, which suggests the long-run sustainability of the uniform pricing strategy. As a result, fairness concerns from consumers provide a natural mechanism for firms to commit to uniform pricing which enhances their profits.

Price Setting with Menu Cost for Multi-Product Firms

Abstract: We model the pricing decisions of a multi-product firm that faces a fixed “menu” cost: once the cost is paid, the firm can adjust the price of all its products. We characterize analytically the steady state firm’s decision in terms of the structural parameters: the variability of the flexible prices, the curvature of the profit function, the size of the menu cost, and the number of products that are sold. We provide expressions for the steady state frequency of adjustment, the hazard rate of price adjustments, and the size distribution of price changes, all in terms of the structural parameters. We study analytically the impulse response of aggregate prices and output to a monetary shock. The cumulative response of output to a monetary shock is the product of three terms: the steady state standard deviation of price changes, the average time elapsed between price changes, and a function of both the number of products and the size of the monetary shock. The size of the cumulative response of output and the length of the half-life of the response of aggregate prices to a monetary shock increase with the number of products, both of them more than double as the number of products goes from 1 to ten, quickly converging to the ones of Taylor’s staggered price model.

Role of Reference Price on Price and Quantity: Insights from Business-to-Business Markets

Abstract: The authors study the role of reference price in a setting in which both the price and the quantity are set through personal interaction during the transaction process, such as in business-to-business markets. Most studies on reference price in the marketing research literature focus on consumer packaged goods, for which prices are typically fixed during the shopping trip and the transaction does not involve personal interaction with a salesperson. In this study, the authors study the effect of reference price on the quantity purchased and also on the pricing outcome of the transaction. They estimate a simultaneous equation system of both pricing and quantity purchased. The findings are as follows: (1) Reference price effects exist on quantity purchased and on the transaction pricing outcome in business-to-business market transactions, (2) business customers react asymmetrically to price increases and price decreases, and (3) salespeople have their own reference prices that affect the transaction...

Retail Price Optimization at InterContinental Hotels Group

Abstract: PERFORMSM with price optimization is the first large-scale enterprise implementation of price optimization in the hospitality industry. The price optimization module determines optimal room rates based on occupancy, price elasticity, and competitive prices. The approach used is a major advancement over existing revenue management systems, which assume that demands by rate segments are independent of price and of each other. As of this writing, over 2,000 InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) hotels use the price optimization module; all IHG properties will eventually use it. To date, price optimization has achieved $145 million in incremental revenue for IHG. At full rollout, we anticipate that this capability will generate approximately $400 million per year.

Is the Effect of Competition on Price Dispersion Non-Monotonic? Evidence from the U.S. Airline Industry

Abstract: We investigate the effect of competition on price dispersion in the airline industry. Using panel data from 1993 to 2008, we find a non-monotonic effect of competition on price dispersion. An increase in competition is associated with greater price dispersion in concentrated markets but is associated with less price dispersion in competitive markets (i.e. an inverse-U relationship). Our empirical findings are consistent with an oligopolistic second-degree price discrimination model and encompass contradictory findings in the literature.

Price Discrimination in the Digital Economy

Abstract: With the developments in information technology firms have more detailed digital information about their prospective and previous customers, which provides new mechanisms for price discrimination. In particular, when firms have information about consumers’ previous buying behavior, they may be able to use this information to offer different prices and/or products to consumers with different purchase histories. This article discusses the effects of price discrimination based on more detailed customer information under monopoly and competition. * This chapter is forthcoming in the Oxford Handbook of the Digital Economy, edited by Martin Peitz and Joel Waldfogel.

Price sensitive demand with random sales price – a newsboy problem

Abstract: Up to now, many newsboy problems have been considered in the stochastic inventory literature. Some assume that stochastic demand is independent of selling price (p) and others consider the demand as a function of stochastic shock factor and deterministic sales price. This article introduces a price-dependent demand with stochastic selling price into the classical Newsboy problem. The proposed model analyses the expected average profit for a general distribution function of p and obtains an optimal order size. Finally, the model is discussed for various appropriate distribution functions of p and illustrated with numerical examples.

A Welfare Evaluation of History-Based Price Discrimination

Abstract: We design an asymmetric duopoly model with inherited market dominance such that the dominant firm and the smaller firm can price discriminate based on consumers’ purchase history We show that uniform pricing softens competition leading to higher industry profits than under history-based pricing Consumers benefit from history-based price discrimination unless the switching cost is sufficiently high and the inherited degree of dominance is sufficiently weak A ban on history-based pricing would typically introduce a distributional conflict between consumers and producers Finally, we establish that the gains to industry profits associated with uniform pricing exceed the associated losses to consumers

Repositioning Dynamics and Pricing Strategy

Abstract: We measure the revenue and cost implications to supermarkets of changing their price positioning strategy in oligopolistic downstream retail markets. Our estimates have implications for long-run market structure in the supermarket industry, and for measuring the sources of price rigidity in the economy. We exploit a unique dataset containing the price-format decisions of all supermarkets in the U.S. The data contain the format-change decisions of supermarkets in response to a large shock to their local market positions: the entry of Wal-Mart. We exploit the responses of retailers to Wal-Mart entry to infer the cost of changing pricing-formats using a "revealed-preference" argument similar to the spirit of Bresnahan and Reiss (1991). The interaction between retailers and Wal-Mart in each market is modeled as a dynamic game. We find evidence that suggests the entry patterns of Wal-Mart had a significant impact on the costs and incidence of switching pricing strategy. Our results add to the marketing literature on the organization of retail markets, and to a new literature that discusses implications of marketing pricing decisions for macroeconomic studies of price rigidity. More generally, our approach which incorporates long-run dynamic consequences, strategic interaction, and sunk investment costs, outlines how the paradigm of dynamic games may be used to model empirically firms' positioning decisions in Marketing.

Determinants of immediate price impacts at the trade level in an emerging order-driven market

Abstract: Common wisdom argues that, in general, large trades cause large price changes, whereas small trades cause small price changes. However, for extremely large price changes, the trade size and news play a minor role, while liquidity (especially price gaps on the limit order book) is a more influential factor. Hence, there might be other factors influencing the immediate price impacts of trades. In this paper, through mechanical analysis of price variations before and after a trade of arbitrary size, we identify that the trade size, the bid–ask spread, the price gaps and the outstanding volumes at the bid and ask sides of the limit order book have an impact on the changes in prices. We propose two regression models to investigate the influence of these microscopic factors on the price impact of buyer-initiated partially filled trades, seller-initiated partially filled trades, buyer-initiated filled trades and seller-initiated filled trades. We find that they have quantitatively similar explanatory powers and these factors can account for up to 44% of the price impacts. Large trade sizes, wide bid–ask spreads, high liquidity at the same side and low liquidity at the opposite side will cause a large price impact. We also find that the liquidity at the opposite side has a more influential impact than the liquidity at the same side. Our results shed new light on the determinants of immediate price impacts.

Design of price mechanisms for network resource allocation via price of anarchy

Abstract: We study the design of price mechanisms for communication network problems in which a user’s utility depends on the amount of flow she sends through the network, and the congestion on each link depends on the total traffic flows over it. The price mechanisms are characterized by a set of axioms that have been adopted in the cost-sharing games, and we search for the price mechanisms that provide the minimum price of anarchy. We show that, given the non-decreasing and concave utilities of users and the convex quadratic congestion costs in each link, if the price mechanism cannot depend on utility functions, the best achievable price of anarchy is $${{4(3-2 \sqrt{2}) \approx 31.4 \% }}$$. Thus, the popular marginal cost pricing with price of anarchy less than 1/3 ≈ 33.3% is nearly optimal. We also investigate the scenario in which the price mechanisms can be made contingent on the users’ preference profile while such information is available.

Price increasing competition? Experimental evidence

Abstract: Economic intuition suggests competition lowers prices. However, recent theoretical work reveals a monopolist may prefer to charge a lower price than a seller facing a competitor with a differentiated product depending upon the joint distribution of buyer values for the products. We explore this relationship using controlled laboratory experiments. Our results indicate price increasing competition is rare due in part to overly intense competition, but after controlling for such behavioral reactions, we find some support for the model. We also explore pricing dynamics and find that sellers are more sensitive to their rivals when buyer values are positively correlated.