TY  - JOUR
A1  - Andres, Maximilian
A1  - Bruttel, Lisa
A1  - Friedrichsen, Jana
T1  - The leniency rule revisited
BT  - experiments on cartel formation with open communication
JF  - International journal of industrial organization
N2  - The experimental literature on antitrust enforcement provides robust evidence that communication plays an important role for the formation and stability of cartels. We extend these studies through a design that distinguishes between innocuous communication and communication about a cartel, sanctioning only the latter. To this aim, we introduce a participant in the role of the competition authority, who is properly incentivized to judge the communication content and price setting behavior of the firms. Using this novel design, we revisit the question whether a leniency rule successfully destabilizes cartels. In contrast to existing experimental studies, we find that a leniency rule does not affect cartelization. We discuss potential explanations for this contrasting result.
KW  - cartel
KW  - judgment of communication
KW  - corporate leniency program
KW  - price competition
KW  - experiment
Y1  - 2021
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijindorg.2021.102728
SN  - 0167-7187
VL  - 76
PB  - Elsevier
CY  - Amsterdam
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Andres, Maximilian
A1  - Bruttel, Lisa
A1  - Friedrichsen, Jana
T1  - How communication makes the difference between a cartel and tacit collusion
BT  - a machine learning approach
JF  - European economic review
N2  - This paper sheds new light on the role of communication for cartel formation. Using machine learning to evaluate free-form chat communication among firms in a laboratory experiment, we identify typical communication patterns for both explicit cartel formation and indirect attempts to collude tacitly. We document that firms are less likely to communicate explicitly about price fixing and more likely to use indirect messages when sanctioning institutions are present. This effect of sanctions on communication reinforces the direct cartel-deterring effect of sanctions as collusion is more difficult to reach and sustain without an explicit agreement. Indirect messages have no, or even a negative, effect on prices.
KW  - cartel
KW  - collusion
KW  - communication
KW  - machine learning
KW  - experiment
Y1  - 2023
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2022.104331
SN  - 0014-2921
SN  - 1873-572X
VL  - 152
SP  - 1
EP  - 18
PB  - Elsevier
CY  - Amsterdam
ER  -