This paper sets out to explain the observed mortgage rate dispersion in the Swedish mortgage rate market through a consumer search model. Utilizing a structural approach that only requires average mortgage rate data, the search cost distribution for consumers are estimated for the period May 2016 to February 2017. Examining the different contract lengths for mortgages, the three-months and one-year mortgage rates do not fit the consumer search cost framework but the two- tree- and five-year fixed mortgage contracts fits well. The results indicate that there is considerable search cost in the mortgage market and that the low number of searches yields considerable market power to the banks, in the sense of being able to price mortgages above marginal cost. Further the fitted model for the five-year fixed mortgage rate is used to simulate the effects from a cost increase for the banking sector. The results indicates that due to the high consumer search costs present in the market, the mortgages facing the consumers will increase substantially to modest cost increases. A decrease in the consumers search costs are also simulated, which results in lower expected mortgage rates. This paper adds to the literature through the use of average monthly data and a search cost perspective to the question of why there are dispersions of mortgage rates in the Swedish mortgage market.

Thesis advisor: Michael Grubb / This dissertation consists of two chapters on the industrial organization of mortgage markets in the United States.In the first chapter, titled “Consumer Search Costs in U.S. Mortgage Markets”, I focus on estimating the distribution of consumer search costs in the market for government-backed mortgages in the US during the period from September 2013 to March 2015. I adapt the Hortaçsu and Syverson (2004) search model to mortgage markets. I estimate the distribution of consumer search costs in each U.S. state using recent data on government-insured mortgages. I find that estimated search costs are large; a median borrower would face a search cost equivalent to about $40 in monthly repayment. At the state-level, search cost magnitude is related positively to household income and age and negatively to years of education. I solve counterfactual scenarios in order to study the relationship between search costs and welfare. Compared to the full information scenario, the presence of costly consumer search decreases social welfare by about $600 in monthly repayment per borrower. This decrease in welfare occurs because under costly search borrowers are matched with lower quality lenders and spend resources on searching. At the national level, this decrease corresponds to approximately $35 million per-month. Reductions in search costs would raise social welfare monotonically. A 10% reduction in search cost may raise social welfare by as much as $130 per borrower per month. These findings support recent policies that aim to reduce search costs of mortgage borrowers. In the second chapter, titled “Price Discrimination in U.S. Mortgage Markets”, I examine the existence of price discrimination generated by costly consumer search in the market for mortgages. I develop a stylized model of consumer search in mortgage markets where firms charge optimal prices that depend on borrowers' search cost level. The model produces testable restrictions on the conditional quantile function of observed transacted rates. Using the data on insured Federal Housing Agency loans where price variation is not driven by default risk, I run a quantile regression of transacted interest rates on a set of loan observables, including borrower's credit score, original principal balance, and loan-to-value ratio, among others. I find that predictions of the theoretical model are satisfied for all loan observables under consideration, and price discrimination created by costly consumer search is likely to exist in U.S. mortgage markets. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2018. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Economics.

O fenômeno da dispersão de preços é mais comum do que se supõe a partir da microeconomia básica. O presente estudo busca avaliar a importância dos custos de procura na dispersão de preços de gasolina e etanol no município de São Paulo. Para tanto, são utilizados como referenciais teóricos modelos de dispersão e estudos de estruturas de mercado. A parte empírica contempla duas etapas, na primeira é estimado qual o mercado relevante para o varejo de combustíveis e, posteriormente, a descrição da dispersão na área. Os dados dos preços de varejo são coletados semanalmente desde o ano de 2001 e a série histórica foi cedida pela Agência Nacional do Petróleo, Gás Natural e Biocombustíveis - ANP. Os resultados das estimações nos mostram que, apesar da dispersão, possivelmente existe maior relação com a heterogeneidade dos estabelecimentos do que com a busca do consumidor. / The price dispersion phenomenon is more common than might be supposed from basic microeconomics. This study aim to evaluate the importance of search costs in the dispersion of fuel prices in São Paulo city. As theoretical reference, we use models of price dispersion and market structures studies. The empirical part has two stages, first is estimated the relevant retail fuel market, and then we describe the dispersion in the area. The retail prices data of gasoline and ethanol have been collected since 2001 and the time series was provided by the Agência Nacional do Petróleo, Gás Natural e Biocombustíveis - ANP. The results shown that although there is dispersion it is more closely related to the establishments heterogeneity, than with consumer search.

Submitted by Paulo Sergio Soares (ps-soares@hotmail.com) on 2017-06-05T19:51:17Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Final.pdf: 620762 bytes, checksum: 4b6198b156d7085162e70f3152b74284 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by GILSON ROCHA MIRANDA (gilson.miranda@fgv.br) on 2017-06-06T13:11:24Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Final.pdf: 620762 bytes, checksum: 4b6198b156d7085162e70f3152b74284 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-06-22T12:45:10Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Final.pdf: 620762 bytes, checksum: 4b6198b156d7085162e70f3152b74284 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017-03-31 / This work replicates Horta¸csu & Syverson (2004) model using Brazilian data. The objective of this paper is to evaluate if search frictions explain price dispersion, administrative fees, in the Brazilian funds industry. We use in our sample passive funds targeting two market indexes: Ibovespa and IRF-M. We found evidence that search costs are higher in the Ibovespa market than the IRF-M market. Considering those funds as differentiated products we observe that the Management Company plays an important role in consumers evaluation. / Este trabalho replica o trabalho de Hotaçsu e Syverson (2004) utilizando dados brasileiros. O objetivo deste trabalho é avaliar se fricções de busca explicam dispersão de preços, taxas de administração, na industria de fundos brasileira. Nos utilizamos em nossa amostra fundos passivos que tentam replicar dois índices: o Ibovespa e o IRF-M. Nos encontramos evidência que custos de busca são maiores em no mercado de fundos Ibovespa. Considerando estes fundos como produtos diferenciados observamos que as empresas gestoras têm um papel importante nas preferências dos consumidores.

O fenômeno da dispersão de preços é mais comum do que se supõe a partir da microeconomia básica. O presente estudo busca avaliar a importância dos custos de procura na dispersão de preços de gasolina e etanol no município de São Paulo. Para tanto, são utilizados como referenciais teóricos modelos de dispersão e estudos de estruturas de mercado. A parte empírica contempla duas etapas, na primeira é estimado qual o mercado relevante para o varejo de combustíveis e, posteriormente, a descrição da dispersão na área. Os dados dos preços de varejo são coletados semanalmente desde o ano de 2001 e a série histórica foi cedida pela Agência Nacional do Petróleo, Gás Natural e Biocombustíveis - ANP. Os resultados das estimações nos mostram que, apesar da dispersão, possivelmente existe maior relação com a heterogeneidade dos estabelecimentos do que com a busca do consumidor. / The price dispersion phenomenon is more common than might be supposed from basic microeconomics. This study aim to evaluate the importance of search costs in the dispersion of fuel prices in São Paulo city. As theoretical reference, we use models of price dispersion and market structures studies. The empirical part has two stages, first is estimated the relevant retail fuel market, and then we describe the dispersion in the area. The retail prices data of gasoline and ethanol have been collected since 2001 and the time series was provided by the Agência Nacional do Petróleo, Gás Natural e Biocombustíveis - ANP. The results shown that although there is dispersion it is more closely related to the establishments heterogeneity, than with consumer search.

Submitted by Mateus Rabello (mateus_rabello@hotmail.com) on 2011-08-24T03:24:58Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação de Mestrado - Mateus Rabello.pdf: 425155 bytes, checksum: eb391a2f1f35ae446621fecfaf956f8b (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Andrea Virginio Machado (andrea.machado@fgv.br) on 2011-08-25T13:20:16Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação de Mestrado - Mateus Rabello.pdf: 425155 bytes, checksum: eb391a2f1f35ae446621fecfaf956f8b (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2011-08-25T13:40:47Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação de Mestrado - Mateus Rabello.pdf: 425155 bytes, checksum: eb391a2f1f35ae446621fecfaf956f8b (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-07-04 / Em modelos de competição de preços, somente um custo de procura positivo por parte do consumidor não gera equilíbrio com dispersão de preços. Já modelos dinâmicos de switching cost consistentemente geram este fenômeno bastante documentado para preços no varejo. Embora ambas as literaturas sejam vastas, poucos modelos tentaram combinar as duas fricções em um só modelo. Este trabalho apresenta um modelo dinâmico de competição de preços em que consumidores idênticos enfrentam custos de procura e de switching. O equilíbrio gera dispersão nos preços. Ainda, como os consumidores são obrigados a se comprometer com uma amostra fixa de firmas antes dos preços serem definidos, somente dois preços serão considerados antes de cada compra. Este resultado independe do tamanho do custo de procura individual do consumidor. / In models of price competition, positive consumer search cost alone does not lead to a price dispersion equilibrium. Dynamic models with switching cost, on the other hand, consistently generate this well-documented feature of retail prices. Even though both literature are vast, very few models attempted to put both frictions together. This paper presents a dynamic model of price competition where identical consumers face both search and switching cost. Equilibrium prices display price dispersion. Moreover, becouse consumers have to commit to a sample size before prices are set, then only two prices will be considered before each purchase. This result is independent of the size of the individual search cost.

It has been noticed that one of the main challenges for e-commerce sites is providing the users with an efficient search function. It has also been noticed that the search function is one of the things the user is valuing the most when evaluating an e-commerce. The information technology enables the possibility to consume almost anything one could wish for. The challenge is in how to find this specific item. It is hence of interest to examine how to improve the search tool and what effect the updated search tool results in. The objective of this research is twofold. The objective motivated by economic factors is to examine how a user’s ability to find relevant items is affected by being able to refine a search result by selecting relevant attribute values. The other objective has a more technical character and is to examine how the rule based method performs in terms of extracting attribute values for enable the creation of the filtering function. The examinations for this research is conducted at a Swedish online auction company that due to the structure of its e-catalogue provides a suitable setup for the examinations. Because of the examinations being conducted in the environment of the auction company’s system this limits the result to only being representative for data with the same characteristics as the auction company’s. For answering the questions stated in the objective two methods are applied. One for examining the economic part and one for examining the technical part. The economic question is answered after analysing the result of an A/B-test conducted at the auction company. For answering the technical examination an information extraction technique is evaluated. The result of the economical examination is that a significant increase in conversion rate can be concluded for the system version with filtering enabled. The result of the technical examination shows that the rule based method can be used for information extraction in some cases. However, the obtained accuracy will be affected by the characteristics of the data the information extraction is performed on.

This thesis develops a macroeconomic model with monopolistic competition and considers the search cost for consumption in order to analyze how advertising influences the major macroeconomic variables and causes the entry barriers. In the short run, we find that advertising will raise aggregate output. The higher the sensitivity of advertising elasticity of search cost, the greater the rising of aggregate output. Further, whether the price level rise or fall is dependent on the magnitude of the advertising elasticity of search cost. The higher sensitivity of this elasticity on advertising, the higher the price level. Moreover, advertising does not influence the market power in the short run. In the long run, we find that whether advertising causes the barriers to entry is determined by the sensitivity of the advertising elasticity of search cost. When this elasticity is small, advertising will create the entry barriers and further strengthen the monopoly power for firms. Furthermore, how advertising affects the price level and aggregate output depends not only on the advertising elasticity of search cost, but also the sensitivity of the elasticity of substitution on the number of firms.

住宅市場是典型的不完全訊息市場，每個市場參與者並不知道潛在交易對象的所在位置、偏好，與保留價格。不完全訊息意涵著，交易者必須透過搜尋才能找到交易對象，因而必須支付搜尋成本，也會形成搜尋市場。不論是住宅交易的買方或者賣方，都可以選擇是自行搜尋交易對象，或者透過仲介業者來協助交易的達成。然而，仲介業者對於住宅搜尋市場之影響，目前仍存在著許多問題是尚待釐清的，而拍賣市場在台灣所扮演的重要性愈來愈高，其市場機制的價格效果也是值得關注的問題： 一、跨區購屋、定錨行為與仲介服務效果 買賣房屋幾乎必然會有議價過程，雙方的議價能力除了受到市場條件的影響外，賣方對於本身所蓋或者所擁有的房屋及附近地區市場等資訊都較買方為多，因此賣方處於較有利的地位。因此，本研究的第一個研究問題即是：就購屋者彼此之間，在地購屋者是否比跨區購屋者具有訊息優勢？參考價格偏誤是否存在？具有訊息優勢的仲介服務能否改善購屋者的搜尋成本與參考價格偏誤？本研究實證結果顯示，基於搜尋成本較高的原因，跨鄉鎮市區的跨區購屋者相對於未跨區者需要多支付3.8%的價格貼水。其次，參考價格愈高的地區，其購屋者會因為定錨效果或參考點偏誤而多支付1%的價格貼水，此外，高價格分配信念的購屋者，平均會支付4.9%的價格貼水。第三，地價上漲率較高地區的購屋者，會誤用自身地區的外推性預期，以為遷入地區也有同等的價格增值空間，而多支付約11.4%的價格貼水。最後，購屋者若尋求仲介服務亦能改善其出價能力，約可降低2.9%的價格貼水，然而，仲介服務在改善搜尋成本與定錨的效果方面則不顯著。 二、仲介服務對於價格分散之影響 本研究利用搜尋成本與價格分散的觀點，檢視具有訊息優勢的仲介服務業者是否真能提高住宅市場的價格搜尋效率。以台北地區的住宅市場資料，指出仲介服務的存在的確可以提高購屋者的搜尋能力。價格分散的估計與檢定結果則顯示：第一，購屋者成交價價格分散小於訂價價格分散；第二，透過仲介服務搜尋者訂價價格分散未顯著異於自行搜尋者的訂價價格分散，可是透過仲介服務搜尋者的成交價價格分散則顯著小於自行搜尋者的成交價價格分散，同時透過仲介服務的價格收斂比率較高。此乃表示，仲介服務業者並未運用其訊息優勢協助賣方進行較有效率的訂價，但是能有效地協助買賣雙方透過配對與議價活動，大幅地降低成交價的價格分散程度。此外，進一步比較國內相關研究結果，目前台北市的住宅市場訊息效率已較過去有顯著的改善，特別是透過仲介服務的改善效果更為明顯。 三、不對稱的仲介服務價格效果 過去有關仲介服務對於交易價格影響的實證結果卻出現許多分歧而不一致的現象，本研究認為過去相關文獻的差異，可能源自以普通最小平方迴歸的方式來估計仲介服務的價格效果時，會忽略住宅價格條件分配的差異。以分量迴歸估計後發現，仲介服務係數在各價格分量呈現很大的差異且顯著，仲介服務的價格效果，在0.10分量約有4.4%的溢價，而 0.75分量以上則約有-5.6%的折價現象。因此，本研究嘗試以高低價格分量的不對稱訂價策略，作為仲介服務價格效果不一致的現象的檢視觀點，並得到實證上的支持。 四、搜尋與拍賣市場機制選擇及拍賣市場績效之再檢視 拍賣市場為購屋者的重要次級市場之一，因此拍賣市場的績效就顯得愈來愈重要。本研究考慮了購屋者的搜尋成本對於市場機制自我選擇偏誤的影響，重新檢視拍賣市場的績效。本研究實證結果顯示，在未考慮自我選擇偏誤下，拍賣市場機制的估計係數為-22.6%，且達1%統計顯著水準。但是，在控制買方與物件的自我選擇偏誤後，我國拍賣市場與搜尋市場間並無顯著的價格差異存在，因而本研究對於過去國內相關文獻認為拍賣市場一定比搜尋市場折價較多的說法，提出了相當的質疑。惟此三年間我國北部地區拍賣市場的拍定率從10%快速成長到30%，而市場條件的快速變化，很可能會造成較大的拍賣價格變異。因此在後續研究上，可以比較拍定率差異較大的時間進行比較研究，以了解本研究結果之穩定度。 / This dissertation employs search theory and behavior theory to study four relative essays. The first essay is to test three questions using a unique data base in the viewpoint of search cost and Anchoring behavior: First, is there anchoring effect or reference price bias on home-purchasing behavior? Second, is there any extrapolative expectation effect of reference price change on homebuyers? Third, can homebuyers reduce price premium from their high search cost or perceived bias? Those answers can help us understand if we can get alternative interpretation to housing price dispersion and if government should provide housing information service. Empirically, we find that out-of-town/district buyers pay a statistically significant price premium in the Taipei area. We also find some evidence consistent with the price premium being driven by high search costs, anchoring effect and extrapolative expectation from heuristics. Finally, homebuyers can lower price premium through real estate brokers in the market. The second essay is to examine the efficiency of housing and brokerage markets in view of price dispersion. We find brokerage service enhance the search ability of homebuyers. We use listing price prices as the prices before search and the actual transaction prices as the price after search, and we also separate the sample into search by homebuyers and search by broker. We find that search by broker decreases the price dispersion compared to search by homebuyers. The third essay is try to explain a number of past and recent studies provided conflicting empirical answers to the effect of real estate brokerage service on housing price. We employ quantile regression to capture the behavior at each quantile of conditional house price distribution and to test the asymmetric effects of brokerage service. An important findings of this paper is that the price effects of real estate brokerage service are significant heterogeneous across the conditional price distribution. The contribution of this paper to the prior literature is to provide empirical evidence by showing that broker might have a positive, negative, or zero impact on the housing prices. The final essay is to discuss the decision making behavior of housing markets mechanism choice. Real estate auction market has been one of main market mechanisms of home purchase. Therefore, the performance of real estate auctions is a very important issue. This article reviews the price premium or discount of real estate auctions by correcting the self-selectivity bias in a view of homebuyers’ search cost. The empirical result shows that the availability of an auction as an alternative has the result of high search cost buyers attending auctions. Next, after accounting for the endogenous nature of this choice and controlling for property and buyer characteristics, prices of properties sold at auction were not lower than those of comparable properties sold in a search market. It is questionable to say the performance of real estate auctions is inferior to that of negotiated sales at Taiwan.

本研究是以中國大陸從2005 年到2010年的風力發電之複合材料葉片產業為背景，討論A公司如何從其原來所屬的防腐蝕複合材料行業，跨入一個完全不同應用的風力葉片複合材料行業。於產業進入過程中，有三家迥然不同規模、屬性、企業文化的企業，於過去數年在大陸市場的競爭為研究範疇。 而在這一市場中依其資本來源，可概分為外資、國企與民企三大類，而因著資本來源不同導致其管理團隊與決策模式，有著極大的差異，因此對交易過程的四種成本亦有相當大的認知與評價差異。而這三家競爭廠商於面對不同客戶屬性時，如何依據其個別公司的不同市場地位、公司資源與技術能量，而採行的市場競爭策略。 A公司於競爭初期，利用其既有的品牌知名度、人脈與通路，以降低C2為第一要務，而後利用C2在地優勢與國際原料大廠建立策略聯盟，產生C1的競爭優勢。進一步利用C1優勢降低客戶C3，隨著個案的增加，增強與上游供應鏈的談判力量，再回頭去強化C1的競爭優勢，以本研究所處的市場，所有的競爭最後都還是回到C1的競爭。並對未來的發展提出如何增強各個成本構面的建議，與提升公司淨利的建議。 / The background of this study is based on the wind blade industry of wind turbine from year 2005 till year 2010 in mainland China. We try to analysis how the company A crosses into an entire new industry – wind blade composites from their original anti-corrosion application. And the scope of this study based on these three enterprises with complete different scales, categories and cultures how to compete in mainland China wind blade composites industry in the past 5 years. We may distinguish those customers into three types based on their different capital compose: foreign enterprise, state own company and private company. Due to the different capital compose, it cause quite obvious difference between the business philosophy of the management team and decision model. It also caused huge difference in recognition and evaluation of four kinds of transaction cost. Those three major suppliers how to take different compete strategies when they are facing different customer attributes based on their own corporate market position, company resources and technology. At the very beginning stage, company A leverages its original brand name, connections and channels in composites industry to lower its C2 as first priority. And then company A tries to build the strategic alliances with those global material suppliers to create the compettive advantage of C1. The further step is to reduce customers’ C3 through its C1 advantage. The more customers company A gets, the more bargain power she has with her supplier chain and then she could strengthen her own C1 competitive strength. The most fundamental competition is always backing to C1 competition in wind blade composite section of wind energy industry in China.