Can Food Processors Use Contracts To Influence Farm Cash Prices? The Competitive Implications Of Top-Of-The-Market And Related Pricing Clauses
When contract production is marketed contemporaneously with production sold through a spot market, it is conveninet to specify the contract price in terms of the subsequent cash price. This paper examines the competitive implications of such pricing arrangements, focusing in particular upon so-called "top-of-the-market (TOMP) pricing in cattle procurement, wherein the contract guarantees the producer the highest cash price prevailing at the time of delivery. We show that these contracts have anticompetitive consequences when the same buyers who purchase cattle with the TOMP clause also compete to procure cattle in the subsequent spot market. By committing to purchase cattle at a price to be determined later, beef packers' incentives to compete aggressively in the spot market are attenuated. Although TOMP pricing is not in producers' collective interest, rational sellers may nonetheless sign these contracts, in some cases with little or no financial inducement.
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
| Length: | |
| Date of creation: | 2002 |
| Handle: | RePEc:ags:aaea02:19776 |
| Contact details of provider: | Postal: 555 East Wells Street, Suite 1100, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53202 Phone: (414) 918-3190 Fax: (414) 276-3349 Web page: http://www.aaea.org Email: More information through EDIRC
|
References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
- Clement Ward & Marvin Hayenga & Ted Schroeder & John Lawrence & Wayne Purcell, 2000.
"Contracting in the U.S. Pork and Beef Industries: Extent, Motives, and Issues,"
Canadian Journal of Agricultural Economics/Revue canadienne d'agroeconomie,
Canadian Agricultural Economics Society/Societe canadienne d'agroeconomie, vol. 48(4), pages 629-641, December.
- Hayenga, Marvin L. & Lawrence, John D. & Ward, Clement E. & Schroeder, Ted C., 2000. "Contracting in the U.S. Pork and Beef Industries: Extent, Motives, and Issues," Staff General Research Papers Archive 10410, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
- Lawrence, John D. & Hayenga, Marvin L. & Ward, Clement E. & Schroeder, Ted C. & Purcell, Wayne, 2002. "Contracting in the U.S. Pork and Beef Industries: Extent, Motives, and Issues," Staff General Research Papers Archive 10157, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
- Monika Schnitzer, 1994. "Dynamic Duopoly with Best-Price Clauses," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 25(1), pages 186-196, Spring.
- Schnitzer, Monika, 1994. "Dynamic duopoly with best-price clauses," Munich Reprints in Economics 3108, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
- Love, H. Alan & Burton, Diana M., 1999. "A Strategic Rationale For Captive Supplies," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 24(01), July.
- Rasmusen, Eric B & Ramseyer, J Mark & Wiley, John S, Jr, 1991. "Naked Exclusion," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(5), pages 1137-1145, December.
- Innes, Robert & Sexton, Richard J., 1993. "Customer coalitions, monopoly price discrimination and generic entry deterrence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 1569-1597, December.
- David E. Davis, 2000. "Does Top of the Market Pricing Facilitate Oligopsony Coordination?," SDSU Working Papers in Progress 12000, South Dakota State University, Department of Economics.
- Schroeter, John R. & Azzam, Azzeddine M., 1999. "Econometric Analysis of Fed Cattle Procurement in the Texas Panhandle," Staff General Research Papers Archive 11365, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
- Ted C. Schroeder & Rodney Jones & James Mintert & Andrew P. Barkley, 1993. "The Impact of Forward Contracting on Fed Cattle Transaction Prices," Review of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 15(2), pages 325-337.
- J. Mark Ramseyer & Eric B. Rasmusen & John Shepard Wiley, 2000. "Naked Exclusion: Reply," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(1), pages 310-311, March.
- Eric Rasmusen & J. Mark Ramseyer & John Wiley, 1999. "Naked Exclusion: A Reply," Industrial Organization 9907001, EconWPA.
- Bernheim, B. Douglas & Peleg, Bezalel & Whinston, Michael D., 1987. "Coalition-Proof Nash Equilibria I. Concepts," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 42(1), pages 1-12, June.
- Azzeddine Azzam, 1998. "Captive Supplies, Market Conduct, and the Open-Market Price," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 80(1), pages 76-83.
- Ward, Clement E. & Koontz, Stephen R. & Schroeder, Ted C., 1998. "Impacts From Captive Supplies On Fed Cattle Transaction Prices," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 23(02), December.
- Thomas E. Cooper, 1986. "Most-Favored-Customer Pricing and Tacit Collusion," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 17(3), pages 377-388, Autumn.
- Elam, Emmett W., 1992. "Cash Forward Contracting Versus Hedging Of Fed Cattle, And The Impact Of Cash Contracting On Cash Prices," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 17(01), July. Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)
This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.
When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:aaea02:19776. 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: (AgEcon Search)
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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.
If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 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.