IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ucp/jnlbus/v65y1992i2p177-98.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Long-Term Contracting and Multiple-Price Systems

Author

Listed:
  • Hubbard, R Glenn
  • Weiner, Robert J

Abstract

This article examines product markets in which long-term contracts and spot transactions coexist. Such markets are characterized by "multiple-price systems," wherein adjustment to supply and demand shocks occurs through spot prices, while contract prices are fixed or adjust slowly. The authors derive the existence of contracts, as well as the equilibrium fraction of spot trade, in the framework of an optimizing model and analyze the effects of shocks on market equilibrium when some buyers and sellers "locked in" contractually. The model is employed to interpret the change in the copper market from a multiple-price system to one characterized solely by spot trade. Copyright 1992 by University of Chicago Press.

Suggested Citation

  • Hubbard, R Glenn & Weiner, Robert J, 1992. "Long-Term Contracting and Multiple-Price Systems," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 65(2), pages 177-198, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jnlbus:v:65:y:1992:i:2:p:177-98
    DOI: 10.1086/296564
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/296564
    File Function: full text
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to JSTOR subscribers. See http://www.jstor.org for details.

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hubbard, R. Glenn & Weiner, Robert J., 1986. "Oil supply shocks and international policy coordination," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 91-106, February.
    2. Hubbard, R Glenn & Weiner, Robert J, 1989. "Contracting and Price Adjustment in Commodity Markets: Evidence from Copper and Oil," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 71(1), pages 80-89, February.
    3. Steven M. Fazzari & R. Glenn Hubbard & Bruce C. Petersen, 1988. "Financing Constraints and Corporate Investment," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 19(1), pages 141-206.
    4. James G. MacKinnon & Nancy D. Olewiler, 1980. "Disequilibrium Estimation of the Demand for Copper," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 11(1), pages 197-211, Spring.
    5. Margaret E. Slade, 1991. "Strategic Pricing with Customer Rationing: The Case of Primary Metals," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 24(1), pages 70-100, February.
    6. John W. Pratt & David A. Wise & Richard Zeckhauser, 1979. "Price Differences in almost Competitive Markets," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 93(2), pages 189-211.
    7. George J. Stigler & James K. Kindahl, 1970. "The Behavior of Industrial Prices," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number stig70-1, March.
    8. Masahiro Kawai, 1983. "Spot and Futures Prices of Nonstorable Commodities Under Rational Expectations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 98(2), pages 235-254.
    9. Carlton, Dennis W, 1979. "Vertical Integration in Competitive Markets under Uncertainty," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 189-209, March.
    10. Turnovsky, Stephen J, 1983. "The Determination of Spot and Futures Prices with Storable Commodities," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 51(5), pages 1363-1387, September.
    11. R. Glenn Hubbard, 1986. "Supply Shocks and Price Adjustment in the World Oil Market," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 101(1), pages 85-102.
    12. Gould, John P, 1978. "Inventories and Stochastic Demand: Equilibrium Models of the Firm and Industry," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 51(1), pages 1-42, January.
    13. Carlton, Dennis W, 1978. "Market Behavior with Demand Uncertainty and Price Inflexibility," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 68(4), pages 571-587, September.
    14. Robert E. Hall, 1984. "The Inefficiency of Marginal-Cost Pricing and The Apparent Rigidity of Prices," NBER Working Papers 1347, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Rotemberg, Julio J, 1982. "Sticky Prices in the United States," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(6), pages 1187-1211, December.
    16. McCafferty, Stephen & Driskill, Robert, 1980. "Problems of Existence and Uniqueness in Nonlinear Rational Expectations Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 48(5), pages 1313-1317, July.
    17. Newbery, David M., 1988. "On the accuracy of the mean-variance approximation for futures markets," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 63-68.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gine,Xavier & Jacoby,Hanan G. & Gine,Xavier & Jacoby,Hanan G., 2016. "Markets, contracts, and uncertainty in a groundwater economy," Policy Research Working Paper Series 7694, The World Bank.
    2. repec:dau:papers:123456789/5372 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. ABADA, Ibrahim & EHRENMANN, Andreas & SMEERS, Yves, 2014. "Endogenizing long-term contracts in gas market models," LIDAM Discussion Papers CORE 2014036, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    4. Glachant, Jean-Michel & Hallack, Michelle & Vazquez, Miguel, 2014. "Gas network and market “à la Carte”: Identifying the fundamental choices," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 238-245.
    5. Mahapatra, Santosh & Levental, Shlomo & Narasimhan, Ram, 2017. "Market price uncertainty, risk aversion and procurement: Combining contracts and open market sourcing alternatives," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 185(C), pages 34-51.
    6. João Teixeira, 2014. "Outsourcing with long term contracts: capital structure and product market competition effects," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 42(2), pages 327-356, February.
    7. Jean-Michel Glachant & Michelle Hallack & Miguel Vazquez, 2014. "Gas network and market diversity in the US, the EU and Australia: A story of network access rights," RSCAS Working Papers 2014/33, European University Institute.
    8. Pinelopi K. Goldberg & Rebecca Hellerstein, 2009. "How rigid are producer prices?," Staff Reports 407, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    9. Miguel Vazquez & Michelle Hallack & Jean-Michel Glachant, 2013. "Gas Network and Market: à la carte?," RSCAS Working Papers 2013/73, European University Institute.
    10. Robert Amano & Scott Hendry, 2003. "Inflation persistence and costly market share adjustment: a preliminary analysis," BIS Papers chapters, in: Bank for International Settlements (ed.), Monetary policy in a changing environment, volume 19, pages 134-146, Bank for International Settlements.
    11. Radetzki, Marian, 2013. "The relentless progress of commodity exchanges in the establishment of primary commodity prices," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 266-277.

    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. R. Glenn Hubbard & Robert J. Weiner, 1985. "Nominal Contracting and Price Flexibility in Product Markets," NBER Working Papers 1738, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Kofman, Paul & Viaene, Jean-Marie, 2000. "The demise of commodity price agreements: the role of exchange rates and special interests," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 775-805, November.
    3. Claudio Agostini, 2005. "Testing for Market Power under the Two-Price System in the U.S. Copper Industry," ILADES-UAH Working Papers inv159, Universidad Alberto Hurtado/School of Economics and Business.
    4. Celso Brunetti, Bahattin Buyuksahin, Michel A. Robe, and Kirsten R. Soneson, 2013. "OPEC "Fair Price" Pronouncements and the Market Price of Crude Oil," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4).
    5. Figuerola-Ferretti, Isabel & Gilbert, Christopher L., 2001. "Price variability and marketing method in non-ferrous metals: : Slade's analysis revisited," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 169-177, September.
    6. Slade, Margaret E., 1999. "Sticky prices in a dynamic oligopoly: An investigation of (s,S) thresholds," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 17(4), pages 477-511, May.
    7. Li, Yanfei & Yao, Shuntian & Chia, Wai-Mun, 2009. "Endogenous Firm and Information Rent Under Demand Uncertainty," MPRA Paper 13506, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 16 Feb 2009.
    8. George Alessandria, 2005. "Consumer search, price dispersion, and international relative price volatility," Working Papers 05-9, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    9. Campbell, Robert B. & Turnovsky, Stephen J., 1985. "An analysis of the stabilizing and welfare effects of intervention in spot and futures markets," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 165-209, November.
    10. de Meza, David & Reito, Francesco, 2020. "Too much waste, not enough rationing: The failure of stochastic, competitive markets," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 188(C).
    11. Mark J. Roberts & Dylan Supina, 1997. "Output Price and Markup Dispersion in Micro Data: The Roles of Producer Heterogeneity and Noise," NBER Working Papers 6075, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Michael Sattinger, 2002. "A Queuing Model of the Market for Access to Trading Partners," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 43(2), pages 533-548, May.
    13. Levy, Daniel & Young, Andrew T., 2004. ""The Real Thing:" Nominal Price Rigidity of the Nickel Coke, 1886-1959," EconStor Open Access Articles, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, pages 765-799.
    14. Lence, Sergio H., 2002. "Do Futures Benefit Farmers Who Adopt Them?," 2002 Annual meeting, July 28-31, Long Beach, CA 19768, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    15. Ronald Balvers, 1992. "A Keynesian general equilibrium model with competitive firms and rational expectations," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 56(1), pages 23-38, February.
    16. Michael Sattinger, 2003. "A Search Version of the Roy Model," Discussion Papers 03-08, University at Albany, SUNY, Department of Economics.
    17. Peters, Michael, 2000. "Limits of Exact Equilibria for Capacity Constrained Sellers with Costly Search," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 95(2), pages 139-168, December.
    18. V. V. Chari & Ravi Jagannathan, 1990. "The simple analytics of commodity futures markets: do they stabilize prices? Do they raise welfare?," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, vol. 4(Sum), pages 12-24.
    19. Méndez Parra, Maximiliano, 2015. "Futures prices, trade and domestic supply of agricultural commodities," Economics PhD Theses 0115, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    20. Dennis, Steven A. & Sim, Ah Boon, 1999. "Share price volatility with the introduction of individual share futures on the Sydney Futures Exchange," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 8(2), pages 153-163, June.

    More about this item

    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:ucp:jnlbus:v:65:y:1992:i:2:p:177-98. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Journals Division). General contact details of provider: https://www.jstor.org/journal/jbusiness .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.