In a Bertrand-oligopoly experiment, firms choose whether or not to engage in cartel-like communication and, if so, they may get fined by a cartel authority. We find that four-firm industries form cartels more often than duopolies because they gain less from a hysteresis effect after cartel...

We analyze the impact of product bundling in experimental markets. One firm has monopoly power in a first market but competes with another firm à la Cournot in a second market. We compare treatments where the multi-product firm (i) always bundles, (ii) never bundles, and (iii) chooses whether...

Private damage claims against cartels may have negative effects on leniency: whereas whistleblowers obtain full immunity regarding the public cartel fines, they have no or only restricted protection against private third-party damage claims. This may stabilize cartels. We run an experiment to...

We analyze the impact of product bundling in experimental markets. One firm has monopoly power in a first market but competes with another firm in a second market. We compare treatments where the multiproduct firm (i) always bundles, (ii) never bundles, and (iii) chooses whether or not to...

In a framework with an upstream monopoly and a downstream duopoly, we analyze the impact of convex costs on the downstream level. In contrast to the case of constant marginal costs, vertical integration does not imply complete market foreclosure. While the non-integrated downstream firm receives...

In this note we study a very simple trial & error learning process in the context of a Cournot oligopoly. Without any knowledge of the payoff functions players increase, respectively decrease, their quantity by one unit as long as this leads to higher profits. We show that despite the absence of...