IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/lmu/muenar/78278.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Time-varying business volatility and the price setting of firms

Author

Listed:
  • Bachmann, Rildiger
  • Born, Benjamin
  • Elstner, Steffen
  • Grimme, Christian

Abstract

Does time-varying business uncertainty/volatility affect the price setting of firms and in what way? We estimate from the micro data of the German ifo Business Climate Survey the impact of idiosyncratic volatility on the extensive margin of firm-level price setting behavior. Heightened uncertainty increases the probability of a price change, suggesting that, for price setting, the volatility effect dominates the "wait-and-see" effect. In a second step, we use structural vector autoregressions to estimate the effects of uncertainty on the intensive pricing margin. Higher uncertainty leads to an increase in price dispersion and to larger price adjustments. (C) 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Suggested Citation

  • Bachmann, Rildiger & Born, Benjamin & Elstner, Steffen & Grimme, Christian, 2019. "Time-varying business volatility and the price setting of firms," Munich Reprints in Economics 78278, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:lmu:muenar:78278
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Susanto Basu & Brent Bundick, 2017. "Uncertainty Shocks in a Model of Effective Demand," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 85, pages 937-958, May.
    2. Nicholas Bloom & Max Floetotto & Nir Jaimovich & Itay Saporta†Eksten & Stephen J. Terry, 2018. "Really Uncertain Business Cycles," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 86(3), pages 1031-1065, May.
    3. Bartosz Mackowiak & Mirko Wiederholt, 2009. "Optimal Sticky Prices under Rational Inattention," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(3), pages 769-803, June.
    4. Bekaert, Geert & Hoerova, Marie & Lo Duca, Marco, 2013. "Risk, uncertainty and monetary policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(7), pages 771-788.
    5. Bachmann, Rüdiger & Elstner, Steffen, 2015. "Firm optimism and pessimism," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 297-325.
    6. Mikhail Golosov & Robert E. Lucas Jr., 2007. "Menu Costs and Phillips Curves," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 115, pages 171-199.
    7. Ryan A. Decker & Pablo N. D'Erasmo & Hernan Moscoso Boedo, 2016. "Market Exposure and Endogenous Firm Volatility over the Business Cycle," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 8(1), pages 148-198, January.
    8. Ben S. Bernanke, 1983. "Irreversibility, Uncertainty, and Cyclical Investment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 98(1), pages 85-106.
    9. Harald Stahl, 2010. "Price adjustment in German manufacturing: evidence from two merged surveys," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(2-3), pages 67-92.
    10. Peter J. Klenow & Oleksiy Kryvtsov, 2008. "State-Dependent or Time-Dependent Pricing: Does it Matter for Recent U.S. Inflation?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(3), pages 863-904.
    11. Jesús Fernández-Villaverde & Pablo Guerrón-Quintana & Keith Kuester & Juan Rubio-Ramírez, 2015. "Fiscal Volatility Shocks and Economic Activity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(11), pages 3352-3384, November.
    12. R?diger Bachmann & Christian Bayer, 2014. "Investment Dispersion and the Business Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(4), pages 1392-1416, April.
    13. Diego Comin & Sunil Mulani, 2006. "Diverging Trends in Aggregate and Firm Volatility," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 88(2), pages 374-383, May.
    14. Bartosz Maćkowiak & Mirko Wiederholt, 2015. "Business Cycle Dynamics under Rational Inattention," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 82(4), pages 1502-1532.
    15. Benjamin Born & Johannes Pfeifer, 2021. "Uncertainty‐driven business cycles: Assessing the markup channel," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 12(2), pages 587-623, May.
    16. Frank Smets & Rafael Wouters, 2007. "Shocks and Frictions in US Business Cycles: A Bayesian DSGE Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(3), pages 586-606, June.
    17. Lawrence J. Christiano & Martin Eichenbaum & Charles L. Evans, 2005. "Nominal Rigidities and the Dynamic Effects of a Shock to Monetary Policy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(1), pages 1-45, February.
    18. Kyle Jurado & Sydney C. Ludvigson & Serena Ng, 2015. "Measuring Uncertainty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(3), pages 1177-1216, March.
    19. Andrea Carriero & Haroon Mumtaz & Konstantinos Theodoridis & Angeliki Theophilopoulou, 2015. "The Impact of Uncertainty Shocks under Measurement Error: A Proxy SVAR Approach," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 47(6), pages 1223-1238, September.
    20. Mark E. Doms & Timothy Dunne, 1998. "Capital Adjustment Patterns in Manufacturing Plants," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 1(2), pages 409-429, April.
    21. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Pablo Guerron-Quintana & Juan F. Rubio-Ramirez & Martin Uribe, 2011. "Risk Matters: The Real Effects of Volatility Shocks," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(6), pages 2530-2561, October.
    22. Karel Mertens & Morten O. Ravn, 2013. "The Dynamic Effects of Personal and Corporate Income Tax Changes in the United States," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(4), pages 1212-1247, June.
    23. Lawrence J. Christiano & Roberto Motto & Massimo Rostagno, 2014. "Risk Shocks," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(1), pages 27-65, January.
    24. Schenkelberg, Heike, 2011. "Why are Prices Sticky? Evidence from Business Survey Data," Discussion Papers in Economics 12158, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    25. David Berger & Ian Dew-Becker & Stefano Giglio, 2020. "Uncertainty Shocks as Second-Moment News Shocks," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 87(1), pages 40-76.
    26. Steven J. Davis & John Haltiwanger, 1992. "Gross Job Creation, Gross Job Destruction, and Employment Reallocation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 107(3), pages 819-863.
    27. Born, Benjamin & Pfeifer, Johannes, 2014. "Policy risk and the business cycle," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 68-85.
    28. R?diger Bachmann & Steffen Elstner & Eric R. Sims, 2013. "Uncertainty and Economic Activity: Evidence from Business Survey Data," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(2), pages 217-249, April.
    29. Scott R. Baker & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis, 2016. "Measuring Economic Policy Uncertainty," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(4), pages 1593-1636.
    30. Jean Boivin & Marc P. Giannoni & Ilian Mihov, 2009. "Sticky Prices and Monetary Policy: Evidence from Disaggregated US Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(1), pages 350-384, March.
    31. Jae Sim & Egon Zakrajsek & Simon Gilchrist, 2010. "Uncertainty, Financial Frictions, and Investment Dynamics," 2010 Meeting Papers 1285, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    32. Nicholas Bloom, 2009. "The Impact of Uncertainty Shocks," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(3), pages 623-685, May.
    33. Berger, David & Vavra, Joseph, 2018. "Dynamics of the U.S. price distribution," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 60-82.
    34. Lein, Sarah M., 2010. "When do firms adjust prices? Evidence from micro panel data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(6), pages 696-715, September.
    35. Vasia Panousi & Dimitris Papanikolaou, 2012. "Investment, Idiosyncratic Risk, and Ownership," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(3), pages 1113-1148, June.
    36. Chris Woolston, 2014. "Rice," Nature, Nature, vol. 514(7524), pages 49-49, October.
    37. Joseph Vavra, 2014. "Inflation Dynamics and Time-Varying Volatility: New Evidence and an Ss Interpretation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 129(1), pages 215-258.
    38. Robert B. Barsky & Eric R. Sims, 2012. "Information, Animal Spirits, and the Meaning of Innovations in Consumer Confidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(4), pages 1343-1377, June.
    39. Sydney C. Ludvigson & Sai Ma & Serena Ng, 2021. "Uncertainty and Business Cycles: Exogenous Impulse or Endogenous Response?," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 369-410, October.
    40. Roberto Motto & Massimo Rostagno & Lawrence J. Christiano, 2010. "Financial Factors in Economic Fluctuations," 2010 Meeting Papers 141, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    41. Steven J. Davis & John Haltiwanger & Ron Jarmin & Javier Miranda, 2007. "Volatility and Dispersion in Business Growth Rates: Publicly Traded versus Privately Held Firms," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2006, Volume 21, pages 107-180, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    42. Leduc, Sylvain & Liu, Zheng, 2016. "Uncertainty shocks are aggregate demand shocks," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 20-35.
    43. Claire Loupias & Patrick Sevestre, 2013. "Costs, Demand, and Producer Price Changes," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 95(1), pages 315-327, March.
    44. Bachmann, Rüdiger & Bayer, Christian, 2013. "‘Wait-and-See’ business cycles?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(6), pages 704-719.
    45. Pablo D. Fajgelbaum & Edouard Schaal & Mathieu Taschereau-Dumouchel, 2017. "Uncertainty Traps," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 132(4), pages 1641-1692.
    46. Calvo, Guillermo A., 1983. "Staggered prices in a utility-maximizing framework," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 383-398, September.
    47. Lutz Kilian, 2009. "Not All Oil Price Shocks Are Alike: Disentangling Demand and Supply Shocks in the Crude Oil Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(3), pages 1053-1069, June.
    48. Jovanovic Mario & Zimmermann Tobias, 2010. "Stock Market Uncertainty and Monetary Policy Reaction Functions of the Federal Reserve Bank," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 10(1), pages 1-19, July.
    49. Tian, Can, 2015. "Riskiness, endogenous productivity dispersion and business cycles," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 227-249.
    50. Julio Blanco & Isaac Baley, 2013. "Learning to Price," 2013 Meeting Papers 663, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    51. Cristina Arellano & Yan Bai & Patrick J. Kehoe, 2019. "Financial Frictions and Fluctuations in Volatility," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 127(5), pages 2049-2103.
    52. Sascha O. Becker & Klaus Wohlrabe, 2008. "European Data Watch: Micro Data at the Ifo Institute for Economic Research – The “Ifo Business Survey”, Usage and Access," Schmollers Jahrbuch : Journal of Applied Social Science Studies / Zeitschrift für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, vol. 128(2), pages 307-319.
    53. repec:oup:qjecon:v:129:y:2013:i:1:p:215-258 is not listed on IDEAS
    54. Rivers, Douglas & Vuong, Quang H., 1988. "Limited information estimators and exogeneity tests for simultaneous probit models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 347-366, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ruediger Bachmann & Benjamin Born & Steffen Elstner & Christian Grimme, 2013. "Time-Varying Business Volatility and the Price Setting of Firms," NBER Working Papers 19180, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Josué Diwambuena & Jean-Paul K. Tsasa, 2021. "The Real Effects of Uncertainty Shocks: New Evidence from Linear and Nonlinear SVAR Models," BEMPS - Bozen Economics & Management Paper Series BEMPS87, Faculty of Economics and Management at the Free University of Bozen.
    3. Jesus Fernandez-Villaverde & Pablo Guerron-Quintana, 2020. "Uncertainty Shocks and Business Cycle Research," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 37, pages 118-166, August.
    4. Meinen, Philipp & Roehe, Oke, 2017. "On measuring uncertainty and its impact on investment: Cross-country evidence from the euro area," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 161-179.
    5. N. Bloom, 2016. "Fluctuations in uncertainty," Voprosy Ekonomiki, NP Voprosy Ekonomiki, issue 4.
    6. Saijo, Hikaru, 2017. "The uncertainty multiplier and business cycles," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 1-25.
    7. Basile, Roberto & Girardi, Alessandro, 2018. "Uncertainty and Business Cycle: A Review of the Literature and Some Evidence from the Spanish Economy/Incertidumbre y Ciclo Empresarial: Revisión de la literatura y evidencia en la economía española," Estudios de Economia Aplicada, Estudios de Economia Aplicada, vol. 36, pages 235-250, Enero.
    8. Giovanni Pellegrino, 2021. "Uncertainty and monetary policy in the US: A journey into nonlinear territory," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 59(3), pages 1106-1128, July.
    9. Rangan Gupta & Chi Keung Marco Lau & Mark E. Wohar, 2019. "The impact of US uncertainty on the Euro area in good and bad times: evidence from a quantile structural vector autoregressive model," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 46(2), pages 353-368, May.
    10. Bonciani, Dario & Roye, Björn van, 2016. "Uncertainty shocks, banking frictions and economic activity," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 200-219.
    11. Pierdzioch Christian & Gupta Rangan, 2020. "Uncertainty and Forecasts of U.S. Recessions," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 24(4), pages 1-20, September.
    12. Kıvanç Karaman, K. & Yıldırım-Karaman, Seçil, 2019. "How does financial development alter the impact of uncertainty?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 33-42.
    13. Magnus Reif, 2020. "Macroeconomics, Nonlinearities, and the Business Cycle," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 87.
    14. Reif Magnus, 2021. "Macroeconomic uncertainty and forecasting macroeconomic aggregates," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 25(2), pages 1-20, April.
    15. Iván Alfaro & Nicholas Bloom & Xiaoji Lin, 2024. "The Finance Uncertainty Multiplier," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 132(2), pages 577-615.
    16. Bachmann, Rüdiger & Elstner, Steffen & Hristov, Atanas, 2017. "Surprise, surprise – Measuring firm-level investment innovations," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 107-148.
    17. Berner, Julian & Buchholz, Manuel & Tonzer, Lena, 2020. "Asymmetric investment responses to firm-specific forecast errors," IWH Discussion Papers 5/2020, Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH).
    18. repec:zbw:bofrdp:2022_005 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Ambrocio, Gene, 2020. "Inflationary household uncertainty shocks," Bank of Finland Research Discussion Papers 5/2020, Bank of Finland.
    20. Nicholas Bloom & Fatih Guvenen & Sergio Salgado, 2016. "Skewed Business Cycles," 2016 Meeting Papers 1621, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    21. Alexander W. Richter & Nathaniel A. Throckmorton, 2017. "A New Way to Quantify the Effect of Uncertainty," Working Papers 1705, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • E30 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:lmu:muenar:78278. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Tamilla Benkelberg (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.