Diese Dissertation beschreibt Marktverzerrungen auf mehreren Ebenen, die entweder aufgrund von Fehlfunktionen oder durch Interventionen politischer Art entstehen. Die Fehlfunktionen schließen einerseits Märkte mit imperfektem Wettbewerb, und andererseits Versagen auf anderweitig vollkommenen Märkten ein. Die Erstgenannten können durch eine starke Konzentration (beispielsweise aufgrund der geringen Größe des Marktes) verursacht werden, durch Ein- oder Austrittsbarrieren, heterogene Güter und Informationsasymmetrien. Zu den Gründen für Marktversagen gehören die Existenz von Externalitäten, Störungen auf anderen, verlinkten Märkten (z.B. die von Kleinbauern erfahrenen Kreditbeschränkungen), hohe Transaktionskosten, öffentliche Güter und Staatsversagen. Abhängig von den Definitionen unterschiedlicher Autoren kann die ungleiche Verteilung von Einkommen oder Vermögen auch als Versagen des Marktmechanismus verstanden werden. In dem Abschnitt dieser Arbeit der sich Marktstörungen widmet wurde der Fokus auf die Nachfrageseite gesetzt, wo die Marktkonzentration mit der Existenz von Monopsonen, Oligopsonen oder Monopsonistischem Wettbewerb assoziiert wird. Die zweite Klasse von Verzerrungen auf den hier betrachteten Märkten wird durch politische Interventionen verursacht. Diese können verschiedene Beweggründe haben, wie die Korrektur der oben beschriebenen Marktstörungen oder Umverteilung zwischen Bevölkerungsgruppen. Das Instrument, das jeweils eingesetzt wird, um Marktversagen zu korrigieren, hängt von der beobachteten Störung ab. Wenn externe Effekte vorhanden sind, kann beispielsweise eine Steuer (Subvention) angewendet werden, um die externen Kosten (Nutzen) zu internalisieren. Umverteilung kann ebenfalls auf verschiedene Arten erreicht werden, beispielsweise durch die Direktzahlungen auf der Ebene der einzelnen Betriebe welche die europäischen Landwirte unterstützen. Um die Ergebnisse von Mikro- und Makroperspektive systematisch zu kombinieren wird die Dimension der Skalen in den theoretischen Rahmen eingeführt. Dies ist notwendig, da sowohl die Auswirkungen von Mikroprozessen auf größere Zusammenhänge, als auch der Einfluss von Makroprozessen auf das Mikroniveau nicht immer offensichtlich sind. Dieser Rahmen wurde auf a) den lokalen Kautschukmarkt in Jambi, Indonesien, der durch starke Nachfragemarktmacht auf allen Ebenen gekennzeichnet ist und b) den europäischen Markt für Zucker angewandt, der stark reguliert ist. Kapitel zwei und drei liefern eine Analyse der Fehlfunktionen innerhalb des indonesischen Kautschukmarkts, von denen sich Kapitel zwei mit einer Mikro- und Kapitel drei mit der Mesoebene befasst. Die Analyse auf Mikroniveau zeigt, dass Kleinhändler von Gummi in Jambi Marktmacht ausüben. Der Preis, den sie ihren Lieferantinnen und Lieferanten bezahlen liegt deutlich unter den Wertgrenzprodukten dieses Inputs. Diese Marktmacht ist größer in abgelegenen Regionen und schwächer mit zunehmender Marktgröße. Auch auf dem größeren Maßstab der verarbeitenden Industrie existiert Marktmacht in beträchtlichem Umfang. Die Fabriken betreiben asymmetrische Preistransmission, was bedeutet, dass Preisänderungen auf dem Weltmarkt schneller auf die Inputpreise übertragen werden wenn der Weltmarktpreis sinkt als in Zeiten von Preissteigerungen. Die asymmetrische Übertragung der Preise allein führt zu einer jährlichen Umverteilung von rund drei Millionen US-Dollar in Jambi. Es lässt sich davon ausgehen, dass die gesamte Umverteilung aufgrund von Marktmacht deutlich größer ist, was aber mit den verfügbaren Daten nicht beurteilt werden kann. Das vierte Kapitel untersucht die Auswirkungen von politischen Interventionen auf der Mesoebene. Der Schwerpunkt der Analyse liegt auf den Ergebnissen einer Marktintervention auf Drittländer, nämlich die Senkung des Interventionspreises auf dem europäischen Zuckermarkt. Diese Preissenkung war von den Auswirkungen der bisherigen Politik, sowie Veränderungen des institutionellen Rahmens, in dem die gemeinsame Marktorganisation für Zucker eingebettet ist, motiviert. Dies sind die Einführung des ‚Everything But Arms‘ Abkommens, sowie Verpflichtungen die sich aus den multilateralen Verhandlungen im Rahmen der Welthandelsorganisation ergaben. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass die Afrikanischen, Karibischen und Pazifischen Staaten in der Tat negativ beeinflusst worden sind, das heißt dass die Erosion von Präferenzen stattgefunden hat. Die Ergebnisse dieser Arbeit sind für künftige Entscheidungen darüber, ob und wie auf den Agrarmärkten interveniert werden soll, relevant. Die entscheidenden Fragen bestehen darin, wann zu intervenieren ist, und durch welche Maßnahme.

One of the main concerns with the introduction of competition in the power sector is the strategic behaviour of market participants. Computable models of strategic behaviour are becoming increasingly important to understand the complexities of competition. Such models can help analyze market designs and regulatory policies. In this thesis, further developments on the modelling and analysis of strategic behaviour in electricity markets are presented. This thesis work has been conducted along three research lines. <br /><br /> In the first research line, an oligopolistic model of a joint energy and spinning reserve market is formulated to analyze imperfect competition. Strategic behaviour is introduced by means of conjectured functions. With this integrated formulation for imperfect competition, the opportunity cost between generation and spinning reserve has been analytically derived. Besides, inter-temporal and energy constraints, and financial transmission rights are taken into account. Under such considerations, competition in electricity markets is modelled with more realism. The oligopolistic model is formulated as an equilibrium problem in terms of complementarity conditions. <br /><br /> In the second research line, a methodology to screen and mitigate the potential exacerbation of market power due to the ownership of financial transmission rights is presented. Hedging position ratios are computed to quantify the hedging level of financial transmission rights. They are based on the actual impact that each participant has in the energy market, and on the potential impact that it would have with the ownership of financial transmission rights. Thus, hedging position ratios are used to identify the potential gambling positions from the transmission rights bidders, and, therefore, used to prioritize critical positions in the auction for transmission rights. <br ><br /> In the last research line, alternative equilibrium models of markets for financial transmission rights are formulated. The proposed equilibrium framework is more natural and flexible for modelling markets than the classic cost-minimization markets. Different markets for financial transmission rights are modelled, namely: i) forwards, ii) options, and iii) joint forwards and options. Moreover, one-period, multi-period and multi-round markets for forwards are derived. These equilibrium models are proposed to analyze the bidding strategies of market participants. The potential impact of bidders on congestion prices is modelled by means of conjectured transmission price functions.

New European energy policies have set a goal of a high share of renewable energy in electricity markets. In the presence of high levels of renewable generation, and especially wind, there is more uncertainty in the supply. It is natural, that volatility in energy production induces the volatility in energy prices. This can create incentives for the generators to exercise market power by traditional means: withholding the output by conventional generators, bidding not the true marginal costs, or using locational market power. In addition, a new type of market power has been recently observed: exercise of market power on ramp rate. This dissertation focuses on modeling the exercise of market power in power systems with high penetration of wind power. The models consider a single, or multiple profit-maximizing generators. Flexibility is identified as one of the major issues in wind-integrated power systems. Therefore, part of the research studies the behavior of strategic hydropower producers as main providers of flexibility in systems, where hydropower is available.Developed models are formulated as mathematical and equilibrium problems with equilibrium constraints (MPECs and EPECs). The models are recast as mixed-integer linear programs (MILPs) using discretization. Resulting MILPs can be solved directly by commercially-available MILP solvers, or by applying decomposition. Proposed Modified Benders Decomposition Algorithm (MBDA) significantly improves the computational efficiency. / <p>QC 20170516</p>

This dissertation consists of two empirical papers that explore recent phenomena in Banking and Microfinance Performance. Chapter 1, “Market Power and Bank Performance in MENA Countries,” examines the determinants of market power in 12 Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) countries in the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), specifically within six Gulf Cooperation Countries and six non-Gulf countries. We examine the dynamics of bank competition in MENA countries, provide an up-to-date assessment of market power, investigate the factors impacting bank competition, and explore the evolution of market power during the financial crisis. Our results show an overall increase in market power following the GFC for both regions. We find that bank size, capitalization, and diversification affect market power differently in the pre-crisis and post-crisis years. Larger banks enjoy cost advantages and the diversification impact on market power has decreased in the post-crisis years and the impact of capitalization on market power increased during the GFC. Overall, banks with higher capitalization can better weather the crisis. Chapter 2, “The impact of firm-level characteristic and county-specific attributes on the performance and efficiency of the Microfinance institutions,” estimates the impact of country-specific macro-variables and firm-specific attributes on the financial performance and the efficiency of microfinance institutions (MFIs). We use a large international up-to-date database consisting of over 10,000 firm-years for MFIs over 89 countries during the period 2008-2015. Several interesting findings emerge: a) regulation and outreach are negatively correlated. b) There is a negative and highly statistically significant correlation between the percentage of female borrowers and loan size, which is evidence of “mission drift”. c) An increase in the percentage of female board member has positive and statistically significant effect on MFIs profitability and ROA; which emphasizes the importance of female participation in leading position in MFIs.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Agricultural Economics / Tian Xia / This dissertation presents the development of a new approach to include the interaction of vertically differentiated products, a subject that has been largely ignored in previous studies, to analyze the market power of exporters and importers in the world markets of agricultural commodities. Three theoretical models, a residual demand elasticity (RDE) model, a residual supply elasticity (RSE) model, and a two-country partial equilibrium trade model, are developed, and the corresponding empirical models are specified for U.S.-Japan soybean trade. Genetically modified (GM) and non-genetically modified (non-GM) soybeans are vertically differentiated products in the sense that GM soybeans are largely defined as an inferior substitute to non-GM soybeans. I compare two versions of these models: a new approach in which the interaction between non-GM and GM soybeans is taken into account and the traditional approach in which the interaction is ignored. In each of the three models (the RDE model, the RSE model, and the partial equilibrium trade model), the traditional approach overestimates the market margin of U.S. non-GM soybean exporters and that of Japanese non-GM soybean importers. By considering the interaction between non-GM and GM soybeans, the new approach greatly reduces the estimates of the corresponding market margins of U.S. exporters and Japanese importers to improve the accuracy of such estimates. The statistical significance of the coefficient estimate of the interaction term, the U.S. GM soybean price or the Japanese GM soybean price, in all three models suggests that the new approach, which includes the interaction between non-GM and GM soybeans, is necessary and preferred. The partial equilibrium trade model includes both an RDE equation and an RSE equation in a system to address the possible contemporaneous cross-equation correlation. Thus, the estimation results of the partial equilibrium trade model are further improved, compared to those of the RDE model and the RSE model. Using the traditional approach to estimate the partial equilibrium trade model, I find that the U.S. non-GM soybean exporters’ market margin is 56.5% and the Japanese non-GM soybean importers’ market margin is 16.1%. However, the results obtained by using the new approach show that the market margins of U.S. exporters and Japanese importers are 33.2% and 6%, respectively. By taking into account the interaction between non-GM and GM soybeans, the new approach improves the accuracy of the estimates of market margins of soybean exporters and importers. U.S. non-GM soybean exporters do have a significant market margin in international markets, but it is not as large as the one suggested by the traditional approach. Although Japanese non-GM soybean importers enjoy some market margin, it is relatively small. The theoretical and empirical models and results in this dissertation provide new and more accurate estimates of residual demand and supply elasticities and market power and improve the understanding on world soybean markets. These results can be useful for industry participants in international soybean markets, academic researchers, and policy makers.

Cette thèse étudie le rôle de la concurrence bancaire en Afrique. Au cours de la dernière décennie, les systèmes bancaires africains ont connu de profondes modifications dans leurs structures affectant le niveau de concurrence bancaire. Alors que l'approche traditionnelle souligne que la concurrence incite les banques à accroître l'offre de fonds et à améliorer leur management, une vision plus pessimiste souligne que la concurrence entre banques peut être néfaste pour l'efficacité, l'inclusion et la stabilité des systèmes bancaires, en particulier dans les marchés opaques. Cette thèse vise donc à éclairer ce débat dans le contexte africain en proposant trois essais empiriques. La première partie de cette thèse fournit une description des systèmes bancaires africains et motive le propos de cette thèse. Une revue de la littérature sur les conséquences de la concurrence bancaire est présentée au chapitre 3. Les différentes mesures de la concurrence sont discutées dans le chapitre 4. Les trois chapitres suivant regroupent les contributions de cette thèse à la littérature. Le chapitre 5 évalue, à partir d'un échantillon de banques d'Afrique de l'Ouest, l'évolution du degré de concurrence bancaire en Afrique au cours de la dernière décennie. Les résultats empiriques issus de plusieurs mesures de la concurrence montrent une intensification du niveau de concurrence. Le chapitre 6 étudie la relation entre le pouvoir de marché et l'efficience des banques. Les résultats soulignent un effet positif du pouvoir de marché sur l'efficience-coût alors que son effet sur l'efficience profit est nul. Le chapitre 7 analyse empiriquement la relation complexe entre le niveau de concurrence et l'accès au crédit pour un échantillon large de 70 pays en développement. Les estimations économétriques soulignent un effet positif de la concurrence sur l'accès au crédit. Les résultats montrent qu'une intensification de la concurrence induit une probabilité plus grande d'obtenir un crédit mais également une probabilité plus forte de demander un crédit pour les entreprises ayant un besoin de financement. La conclusion générale de cette thèse souligne les effets bénéfiques de la concurrence bancaire même au sein des systèmes financiers peu matures et discute plusieurs mesures visant à favoriser la concurrence sur ces marchés. / This thesis is concerned with the role of interbank competition in Africa. During the past decade, African banking systems have witnessed profound changes in their structure with some implications on the level of competition. Although the traditional view argues that intensified competition encourages banks to increase the supply of funds and improves banks management, a more pessimistic view sustains that competition can be detrimental for efficiency, inclusion and stability of banking sectors, especially in opaque markets. The aim of this dissertation is therefore to shed a new light on this debate in the context of Africa by offering three empirical contributions. The first part of this thesis provides an overview of financial systems in sub-Saharan Africa and motivates the purpose of this dissertation. A review of the literature on the consequences of competition in banking is presented in Chapter 3. The different measures of competition in banking are discussed in Chapter 4. The three following chapters focus on the original contributions of this dissertation. Chapter 5 evaluates the evolution of bank competition over the last decade in African countries using a sample of West African banks. The findings, based on different measures of competition, show an increase of competition over the past decade. Chapter 6 investigates the relationship between market power and efficiency. Empirical results document that banks with more market power are able to reduce costs but do no better at maximizing profits than banks with less market power. In Chapter 7, the complex relation ship between credit availability and competition is analyzed using a large sample of 70 developing countries. Findings show that firms located in countries with competitive banking markets have a significantly lower probability to be credit constrained. Results show that competition not only leads to less severe loan approval decisions but also reduces borrowers' discouragement. The general conclusion of this thesis underlines the beneficial consequences of competition even in on-mature banking systems and discusses several measures to enhance competition in these markets.

My dissertation consists of three chapters. In the first chapter, I analyze theeffect of the merger between American Airlines (AA) & US Airways (US) on market price and product quality. I use two complementary methodologies: difference-in-differences (DID) and merger simulation. Contrary to other results in the airline literature, the DID analysis shows that, overall, price has decreased as a result of themerger. While divestitures required as part of the merger had a strong price-reducing effect, the overall decrease involves non-divestiture markets as well. Interestingly, the decrease appears only in large airport-pair markets, whereas prices rose considerably in smaller ones. Effects on quality are mixed. The DID analysis shows that the merger reduced flight cancellations, increased flight delays, and had no effect on flight frequency or capacity overall. Using merger simulation, I find that the change in ownership leads to a 3% increase in price. The structural model performs betterin predicting the post-merger price if I allow the model to deviate from the Bertrand-Nash conduct. A 10% cost reduction due to the merger is able to predict the post-merger price quite well. When I incorporate a conduct parameter into the model, the required percentage of cost savings is lower. Given the divestiture and the subsequententry of low-cost carriers (LCCs), tacit collusion may break down. Thus both cost savings and reduced cooperation could explain a reduction in the price in the post-merger period.<div><br></div><div>In my second chapter, I analyze possible reasons why airline prices are higher inthe smaller markets compared to larger markets. In the literature, most of the studies ignore the fact that the smaller markets are different compared to larger markets in terms of the nature of competition. I find that a combination of lower competition, and lack of entry from low cost carriers (LCCs) are the reasons behind higher prices in the smaller city-pair markets. I show that price is substantially higher in a market with a fewer number of firms controlling for several other factors. My paper estimates the modified critical number of firms to be 5 and the critical value of the HHI to be .6.<br><div><br></div><div>In my third chapter, I study the effect of announcement of investment in research & development (R&D) on the value of a firm in the pharmaceutical industry. Three types of R&D by the pharmaceutical firms are considered for the analysis: acquisition of other smaller firms, internal investment in R&D, and collaborative investment in R&D. This chapter finds that few target specific characteristics and financial charac-teristics of the acquiring firm are important drivers of the abnormal returns around the announcement period.<br></div><div><br></div></div>

O objetivo desta dissertação é realizar um estudo sobre a evolução das estruturas de mercado da indústria de máquinas agrícolas em âmbito mundial, destacando os países e o contexto de sua origem, bem como as características de sua expansão internacional. As estratégias de fusão e aquisição, adotadas como forma predominante de entrada em novos mercados, são enfatizadas, assim como o seu papel sobre o aumento do poder de mercado na indústria brasileira de tratores agrícolas. Para isso o trabalho foi dividido em três capítulos. O primeiro capítulo traz o embasamento teórico sobre as estruturas de mercado em oligopólio e suas formas de concorrência, além de um levantamento histórico da indústria de forma a relacioná-los, destacando suas principais características e marcos de sua evolução. O segundo capítulo traz um panorama geral da indústria e do mercado de máquinas agrícolas mundial na última década, definindo os principais players, suas características e vantagens que proporcionaram o desenvolvimento desta indústria, além de uma caracterização dos padrões de comércio internacional predominantes. Por fim, o último capítulo tem seu foco no caso brasileiro e analisa os impactos da concentração de mercado sobre desempenho da indústria em termos de poder de mercado, realizando, para isto, a estimação dos parâmetros de uma função demanda por tratores agrícolas (elasticidade preço da demanda) e de um indicador de poder de mercado (índice de Lerner). Os resultados desta pesquisa permitem demonstrar que esta indústria tornou-se concentrada com o advento da Revolução Industrial, formando um grande oligopólio, primeiramente em nível nacional e, posteriormente, internacional. A concentração e a internacionalização deram-se principalmente por meio de fusões e aquisições, tendo impactos sobre os níveis e as formas de concorrência predominantes. Os países emergentes exercem papel cada vez mais importante como produtores e demandantes de tratores e colheitadeiras, embora os Estados Unidos e a Europa sejam ainda os principais mercados para esta indústria. No mercado brasileiro, ainda que não tenham ocorrido mudanças significativas na elasticidade preço da demanda, a fusão de duas grandes multinacionais elevou significativamente os índices de poder de mercado por meio do aumento da concentração de mercado. / The aim of this study is to conduct an analysis about the evolution of market structures of agricultural machinery worldwide industry, highlighting the countries and the context of its origin, as well as the characteristics of its international expansion. Merger and acquisition strategies, adopted as predominant form of entry into new markets, are emphasized, as well as its role on the increase of market power in the Brazilian industry of agricultural tractors. The work was divided into three chapters. The first chapter provides the theoretical basis on oligopoly market structures and its forms of competition, in addition to a historical survey of the industry in order to relate them, highlighting its main features and landmarks of its evolution. The second chapter provides an overview of the industry and world agricultural machinery market in the last decade, defining the major players, their characteristics and advantages that afforded the development of this industry, in addition to a characterization of predominant international trade patterns. Finally, the last chapter has its focus on the Brazilian case and analyzes the impacts of market concentration on the industry\'s performance in terms of market power, performing, for this, the estimation of the parameters of a demand function for agricultural tractors (price elasticity of demand) and an indicator of market power (Lerner index). The results allow demonstrating that this industry became concentrated with the advent of the Industrial Revolution, forming a large oligopoly, first at national level and, subsequently, international. The concentration and internationalization came mainly through mergers and acquisitions, having impacts on the levels and forms of competition prevalent. Emerging countries has increased their importance as producers and plaintiffs of tractors and combines, though the United States and Europe are the main markets for this industry. In the Brazilian market, although there have been no significant changes in the price elasticity of demand, the merger of two large multinationals has raised significantly the market power by increasing market concentration.

Les deux derniers siècles ont connu une révolution exceptionnelle dans l'organisation des marchés électriques dans le monde entier. Ainsi, traditionnellement organisé autour de monopoles verticalement intégrés et soumis à la régulation, le secteur électrique connait un processus de réforme et évolue vers une organisation décentralisée qui favorise les mécanismes du marché. Le passage des tarifs régulés à des prix du marché, compte tenu des structures concentrées et les caractéristiques particulières de l'industrie électrique, accroît la possibilité que certaines entreprises puissent manipuler les prix du marché en exerçant leur pouvoir de marché. Les questions de "pouvoir de marché" dans un secteur donné ont été abondamment étudiées dans la littérature de l'économie Industrielle depuis la fin des années 1970, mais des études théoriques et empiriques de "pouvoir de marché dans les marchés électriques" n'ont été développées que récemment. Dans cette thèse, nous essayons de mener une recherche approfondie autour des questions de pouvoir de marché sur les marchés de gros de l'électricité en Europe. Nous conduisons des études empiriques dans deux des plus grands marchés européens: la France (sur des données 2009-2012) et l'Allemagne (sur des données de 2011), en utilisant des méthodes économétriques et des modèles de simulation des marchés électriques. Le sujet semble pertinent dans la période de transition énergétique en Europe. / The two last centuries have witnessed an exceptional revolution in the organization of electric power markets worldwide. The industry's organization has changed from vertically integrated monopolies under regulation to unbundled structures that favor market mechanisms; known as reform process in Europe. The shift to reliance on market prices, given concentrated structures and particular characteristics of electricity industry, raises a possibility that some firms could influence the market prices by exercising their market power. The issues of "market power" in a given industry have been abundantly employed in the literatureof Industrial Organization since the late 1970s but theoretical and empirical studies of "market power in electricity markets" have only been developed recently. In this thesis, we attempt to carry out an insight research around market power questions in deregulated wholesale electricity markets in Europe, as regarding the way of defining and measuring it. We carry out empirical studies in two of the biggest liberalized electricity markets in Europe: France (2009-2012's data) and Germany (2011's data), using econometric regressions and electricity simulation models as main methodologies. The subject is particularly relevant inthe context of energy transition in Europe (transition energetique in France and Energiewende in Germany).

One of the main concerns with the introduction of competition in the power sector is the strategic behaviour of market participants. Computable models of strategic behaviour are becoming increasingly important to understand the complexities of competition. Such models can help analyze market designs and regulatory policies. In this thesis, further developments on the modelling and analysis of strategic behaviour in electricity markets are presented. This thesis work has been conducted along three research lines. <br /><br /> In the first research line, an oligopolistic model of a joint energy and spinning reserve market is formulated to analyze imperfect competition. Strategic behaviour is introduced by means of conjectured functions. With this integrated formulation for imperfect competition, the opportunity cost between generation and spinning reserve has been analytically derived. Besides, inter-temporal and energy constraints, and financial transmission rights are taken into account. Under such considerations, competition in electricity markets is modelled with more realism. The oligopolistic model is formulated as an equilibrium problem in terms of complementarity conditions. <br /><br /> In the second research line, a methodology to screen and mitigate the potential exacerbation of market power due to the ownership of financial transmission rights is presented. Hedging position ratios are computed to quantify the hedging level of financial transmission rights. They are based on the actual impact that each participant has in the energy market, and on the potential impact that it would have with the ownership of financial transmission rights. Thus, hedging position ratios are used to identify the potential gambling positions from the transmission rights bidders, and, therefore, used to prioritize critical positions in the auction for transmission rights. <br ><br /> In the last research line, alternative equilibrium models of markets for financial transmission rights are formulated. The proposed equilibrium framework is more natural and flexible for modelling markets than the classic cost-minimization markets. Different markets for financial transmission rights are modelled, namely: i) forwards, ii) options, and iii) joint forwards and options. Moreover, one-period, multi-period and multi-round markets for forwards are derived. These equilibrium models are proposed to analyze the bidding strategies of market participants. The potential impact of bidders on congestion prices is modelled by means of conjectured transmission price functions.