L1 - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance

• An Anatomy of Firms’ Political Speech

  Staff Working Paper 2024-37 Pablo Ottonello, Wenting Song, Sebastian Sotelo

  We study the distribution of political speech across U.S. firms. We develop a measure of political engagement based on firms’ communications (earning calls, regulatory filings, and social media) by training a large language model to identify statements that contain political opinions. Using these data, we document five facts about firms’ political engagement.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Firm dynamics, Market structure and pricing, Recent economic and financial developments JEL Code(s): D, D2, D22, D6, D63, G, G4, G41, L, L1, L11, L2, L20

• Markups and Inflation in Oligopolistic Markets: Evidence from Wholesale Price Data

  Staff Working Paper 2024-20 Patrick Alexander, Lu Han, Oleksiy Kryvtsov, Ben Tomlin

  We study how the interaction of market power and nominal price rigidity influences inflation dynamics. We find that pass-through declines with price stickiness when markets are concentrated, which implies a lower slope of the New Keynesian Phillips curve.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Firm dynamics, Inflation and prices, Market structure and pricing, Monetary policy transmission JEL Code(s): D, D4, D43, E, E3, E31, L, L1, L13, L8, L81

• Decomposing Systemic Risk: The Roles of Contagion and Common Exposures

  Staff Working Paper 2024-19 Grzegorz Halaj, Ruben Hipp

  We examine systemic risks within the Canadian banking sector, decomposing them into three contribution channels: contagion, common exposures, and idiosyncratic risk. Through a structural model, we dissect how interbank relationships and market conditions contribute to systemic risk, providing new insights for financial stability.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods, Economic models, Financial institutions, Financial stability JEL Code(s): C, C3, C32, C5, C51, G, G2, G21, L, L1, L14

• Pricing behaviour and inflation during the COVID-19 pandemic: Insights from consumer prices microdata

  Staff Analytical Note 2024-6 Olga Bilyk, Mikael Khan, Olena Kostyshyna

  Using the microdata underlying the Canadian consumer price index, we study how often and by how much firms changed their prices during the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that the surge in inflation was mainly associated with retailers raising prices much more often than before. We also find that more recently, corporate price-setting behaviour appears to be approaching pre-pandemic norms.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff analytical notes Topic(s): Firm dynamics, Inflation and prices, Recent economic and financial developments JEL Code(s): D, D2, D22, E, E3, E31, L, L1, L11

• The Role of Long-Term Contracting in Business Lending

  Staff Working Paper 2024-2 Phoebe Tian

  This paper examines inefficiencies arising from a lack of long-term contracting in small business lending in China.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial institutions JEL Code(s): D, D8, D83, D86, G, G2, G21, L, L1, L14, L2, L26

• Market structure of cryptoasset exchanges: Introduction, challenges and emerging trends

  Staff Analytical Note 2024-2 Vladimir Skavysh, Jacob Sharples, Sofia Priazhkina, Salman H. Hasham

  This paper provides an overview of cryptoasset exchanges. We contrast their design with exchanges in traditional financial markets and discuss emerging regulatory trends and innovations aimed at solving the problems cryptoasset exchanges face.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff analytical notes Topic(s): Digital currencies and fintech, Payment clearing and settlement systems JEL Code(s): G, G1, G15, L, L1

• Testing Collusion and Cooperation in Binary Choice Games

  Staff Working Paper 2023-58 Erhao Xie

  This paper studies the testable implication of players’ collusive or cooperative behaviour in a binary choice game with complete information. I illustrate the implementation of this test by revisiting the entry game between Walmart and Kmart.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods, Market structure and pricing JEL Code(s): C, C5, C57, L, L1, L13

• Digitalization: Prices of Goods and Services

  Staff Discussion Paper 2023-27 Vivian Chu, Tatjana Dahlhaus, Christopher Hajzler

  This paper outlines and assesses the various channels through which digitalization can affect prices of goods and services.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff discussion papers Topic(s): Digitalization, Inflation and prices, Market structure and pricing, Monetary policy JEL Code(s): D, D2, E, E3, E31, E5, E52, L, L1, L11

• Intermediary Market Power and Capital Constraints

  Staff Working Paper 2023-51 Jason Allen, Milena Wittwer

  We examine how intermediary capitalization affects asset prices in a framework that allows for intermediary market power. We introduce a model in which capital-constrained intermediaries buy or trade an asset in an imperfectly competitive market, and we show that weaker capital constraints lead to both higher prices and intermediary markups.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Financial institutions, Market structure and pricing JEL Code(s): D, D4, D40, D44, G, G1, G12, G18, G2, G20, L, L1, L10

• Competition for Exclusivity and Customer Lock-in: Evidence from Copyright Enforcement in China

  Staff Working Paper 2023-43 Youming Liu

  This paper studies the music streaming industry and argues that having exclusive rights granted by copyright law drives firms to offer exclusive content to lock in customers. I employ theoretical and descriptive empirical analysis, along with a dynamic structural model, to support the argument and explore policies for improving competition.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers Topic(s): Econometric and statistical methods, Firm dynamics, Market structure and pricing JEL Code(s): L, L1, L13, L4, L42, L5, L51