IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/iuiwop/1527.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Nonparametric Tests for Perfect Competition: Theory and Application to the Nordic Wholesale Electricity Market

Author

Listed:

Abstract

This paper develops a simple nonparametric test for perfect competition in markets for homogeneous goods. The method only requires data on prices and some aggregate of output. We then generalize the method to account for variable capacity and intertemporal production decisions. We apply the method to a sample of Swedish data from the Nordic wholesale electricity market. The main results show that the data are approximately rationalizable by perfect competition in bidding zones with low ownership concentration of generation assets, but not in bidding zones characterized by high ownership concentration.

Suggested Citation

  • Hjertstrand, Per & Tangerås, Thomas, 2025. "Nonparametric Tests for Perfect Competition: Theory and Application to the Nordic Wholesale Electricity Market," Working Paper Series 1527, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:iuiwop:1527
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ifn.se/wfiles/wp/wp1527.pdf
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andrés Carvajal & Rahul Deb & James Fenske & John K.‐H. Quah, 2013. "Revealed Preference Tests of the Cournot Model," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 81(6), pages 2351-2379, November.
    2. Afriat, Sidney N, 1972. "Efficiency Estimation of Production Function," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 13(3), pages 568-598, October.
    3. Laurens Cherchye & Thomas Demuynck & Bram Rock & Kristof Witte, 2014. "Non‐parametric Analysis of Multi‐output Production with Joint Inputs," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(577), pages 735-775, June.
    4. Cox, Thomas L & Chavas, Jean-Paul, 1990. "A Nonparametric Analysis of Productivity: The Case of U.S. Agriculture," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 17(4), pages 449-464.
    5. Lundin, Erik & Tangerås, Thomas P., 2020. "Cournot competition in wholesale electricity markets: The Nordic power exchange, Nord Pool," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    6. Bresnahan, Timothy F., 1982. "The oligopoly solution concept is identified," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 10(1-2), pages 87-92.
    7. Thomas P. Tangerås & Johannes Mauritzen, 2018. "Real‐time versus day‐ahead market power in a hydro‐based electricity market," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 66(4), pages 904-941, December.
    8. Dae‐Wook Kim & Christopher R. Knittel, 2006. "Biases In Static Oligopoly Models? Evidence From The California Electricity Market," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(4), pages 451-470, December.
    9. Ashenfelter, Orley & Sullivan, Daniel, 1987. "Nonparametric Tests of Market Structure: An Application to the Cigarette Industry," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(4), pages 483-498, June.
    10. Christopher P. Chambers & John Rehbeck, 2022. "Nonparametric market supply with variable participants," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 74(3), pages 899-921, October.
    11. Lau, Lawrence J., 1982. "On identifying the degree of competitiveness from industry price and output data," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 10(1-2), pages 93-99.
    12. Hanoch, Giora & Rothschild, Michael, 1972. "Testing the Assumptions of Production Theory: A Nonparametric Approach," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 80(2), pages 256-275, March-Apr.
    13. Chambers, Christopher P. & Rehbeck, John, 2025. "Testing profit maximization in the U.S. cement industry," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 231(C).
    14. Severin Borenstein & James B. Bushnell & Frank A. Wolak, 2002. "Measuring Market Inefficiencies in California's Restructured Wholesale Electricity Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1376-1405, December.
    15. Laurens Cherchye & Thomas Demuynck & Bram Rock & Kristof Witte, 2014. "Non‐parametric Analysis of Multi‐output Production with Joint Inputs," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(577), pages 735-775, June.
    16. Kellie Curry Raper & H. Alan Love & C. Richard Shumway, 2007. "Distinguishing the Source of Market Power," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 89(1), pages 78-90.
    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. Laurens Cherchye & Thomas Demuynck & Bram De Rock & Marijn Verschelde, 2018. "Nonparametric identification of unobserved technological heterogeneity in production," Working Paper Research 335, National Bank of Belgium.
    2. Laurens Cherchye & Thomas Demuynck & Bram De Rock & Marijn Verschelde, 2018. "Nonparametric Production Analysis with Unobserved Heterogeneity in Productivity," Working Papers ECARES 2018-25, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    3. Erik Lundin, 2021. "Market Power and Joint Ownership: Evidence from Nuclear Plants in Sweden," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 69(3), pages 485-536, September.
    4. Laurens Cherchye & Thomas Demuynck & Bram De Rock & Cédric Duprez & Glenn Magerman & Marijn Verschelde, 2021. "Structural Identification of Productivity under Biased Technological Change∗," Working Papers ECARES 2021-28, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    5. Cherchye, Laurens & Demuynck, Thomas & De Rock, Bram, 2013. "The empirical content of Cournot competition," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 148(4), pages 1552-1581.
    6. Aguiar, Victor H. & Kashaev, Nail & Allen, Roy, 2023. "Prices, profits, proxies, and production," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 235(2), pages 666-693.
    7. Fridolfsson, Sven-Olof & Tangerås, Thomas P., 2009. "Market power in the Nordic electricity wholesale market: A survey of the empirical evidence," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(9), pages 3681-3692, September.
    8. Cherchye, Laurens & Rock, Bram De & Walheer, Barnabé, 2015. "Multi-output efficiency with good and bad outputs," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 240(3), pages 872-881.
    9. Cherchye, Laurens & De Rock, Bram & Hennebel, Veerle, 2014. "The economic meaning of Data Envelopment Analysis: A ‘behavioral’ perspective," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 29-37.
    10. Cherchye, Laurens & De Rock, Bram & Walheer, Barnabé, 2016. "Multi-output profit efficiency and directional distance functions," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 100-109.
    11. Noelke, Corinna M. & Raper, Kellie Curry, 1998. "Parametric And Nonparametric Market Power Tests: An Empirical Investigation," 1998 Annual meeting, August 2-5, Salt Lake City, UT 20875, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    12. Ding, Jingjing & Dong, Wei & Liang, Liang & Zhu, Joe, 2017. "Goal congruence analysis in multi-Division Organizations with shared resources based on data envelopment analysis," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 263(3), pages 961-973.
    13. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock, 2024. "Nonparametric Analysis of Separable Production Technologies with Intermediate Inputs," Working Papers ECARES 2024-13, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    14. Raper, Kellie Curry & Noelke, Corinna M., 2001. "Deterministic Nonparametric Market Power Tests: An Empirical Investigation," Staff Paper Series 11757, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    15. Lundin, Erik & Tangerås, Thomas P., 2020. "Cournot competition in wholesale electricity markets: The Nordic power exchange, Nord Pool," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    16. Chen, Yuquan & Yu, Xiaohua, 2018. "Does the centralized slaughtering policy create market power for pork industry in China?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 59-71.
    17. Laurens Cherchye & Bram Rock, 2025. "Nonparametric analysis of separable production technologies with intermediate inputs," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 63(3), pages 245-254, June.
    18. Ronchi, Loraine, 2006. "Fairtrade and market failures in agricultural commodity markets," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4011, The World Bank.
    19. Cherchye, Laurens & De Rock, Bram & Kerstens, Pieter Jan, 2018. "Production with storable and durable inputs: Nonparametric analysis of intertemporal efficiency," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 270(2), pages 498-513.
    20. Vítor Marques & Isabel Soares & Adelino Fortunato, 2012. "Application of a Structural Model to the Spanish Electricity Wholesale Market," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(4), pages 65-108.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Competition; Nonparametric methods; Nord Pool power exchange; Wholesale electricity markets;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D22 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Empirical Analysis
    • D43 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Oligopoly and Other Forms of Market Imperfection
    • D44 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Auctions

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:hhs:iuiwop:1527. 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: Elisabeth Gustafsson (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iuiiise.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.