External referencing (ER) imposes a price cap for pharmaceuticals based on prices of identical products in foreign countries. Suppose a foreign country (F) negotiates prices with a pharmaceutical firm while a home country (H) can either negotiate independently or implement ER based on the...

This paper analyzes the timing decisions of pharmaceutical firms to launch a new drug in countries involved in international reference pricing. We show three important features of launch timing when all countries reference the prices in all other countries and in all previous periods of time....

This paper analyzes how drug approval procedures influence the incentives of pharmaceutical firms to launch new drugs in the presence of international reference pricing. First, we show that the set of countries in which a firm commercializes a new drug is larger when countries do not approve...