Online seminar – Algorithmic pricing and competition: Empirical evidence from the German retail gasoline market

Daniel Ershov, Assistant Professor, Toulouse School of Economics

We provide the first empirical analysis of the relationship between algorithmic pricing (AP) and competition by studying the impact of adoption in Germany’s retail gasoline market, where software became widely available in 2017. Because adoption dates are unknown, we identify adopting stations by testing for structural breaks in AP markers, finding most breaks to be around the time of widespread AP introduction. Because station adoption is endogenous, we instrument using headquarters adoption. Adoption increases margins, but only for non-monopoly stations. In duopoly stations, margins increase only if both stations adopt, suggesting that AP has a significant effect on competition.

Speaker bio

Daniel Ershov is an Assistant Professor at the Toulouse School of Economics. He is also a CESifo Research Network Affiliate and a CEPR Research Affiliate. Daniel specialises in Empirical Industrial Organisation. His main research interests are firm competition, market regulation, and online markets. His most recent research looks at the effects of algorithmic pricing competition using German gasoline data, and the effects of advertising disclosure regulations online using data from Instagram. Daniel also studies the effects of changes in consumer search costs on entry and product design in the Google Play mobile app store. He holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Toronto.

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Meeting ID: 880 9681 5173
Password: 130612

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