Collusion

The United States acute care hospital (ACH) market provides a unique environment in which to examine questions about market structure and performance.  The ACHs operate in a mature market of health services that is highly regulated and
has one dominant primary consumer of services. The uncharacteristic industry structure offers the opportunity to analyze pervasive agency relationships and capital structure issues in a new setting. In addition, the policies of the U.S. Government have created an environment in which tacit collusion is likely to flourish, which leads to market buyer power (monopsony, or buyers acting as one monopoly buyer). A key
question is the extent to which monopsony and agency affect capital structure decisions. Agency is defined by Ross (1973, p.134) as a relationship formed between a principle and their agents, “when one, designated as the agent, acts for, on behalf of, or as representative for the other, designated the principal, in a particular domain of decision problems.” This thesis extends the agency framework provided by Jensen and Meckling (1976), along with the econometric understanding of monopsony in healthcare via tacit collusion, as suggested by Pauly (1998) and Sevilla (2005), and the research constraints of monopsony under an all-or-nothing contract, as outlined by Taylor (2003). Using data on ACHs from the period of 1995 to 2007 for approximately 5,000 ACHs, which was derived from the Medicare Cost Report and medical payments for a sub-population of 1,500, this research examines the determinants of capital structure in a distorted market. Building upon this initial analysis, the research seeks to
examine the effects of market distortions upon free cash flow, and ultimately, capital structure. Two theories of distortion are presented that would affect free cash flow: The first is that of the agency cost of free cash flow and signaling, and the second is a theory of monopsony via tacit collusion between buyers.
A model of the agency relationship between ACHs and the U.S. Government is proposed, promoting agency cost (signaling and the agency cost of free cash flows) as a causal relation with free cash flows and capital structure (Jensen & Meckling 1976; Jensen 1986). Empirical models of agency are constructed, examining the dependence on government business and the relation to the leverage (signaling) and free cash flows (agency cost of free cash flows) for ACHs. In addition, a complementary theory of capital structure determinant via market power
(monopsony) is formulated, suggesting that monopsony conditions within the ACH market affect free cash flows and capital structure. The analysis provides a framework
for understanding the environments in which ACHs operate and the strength of bargaining within the market. The research concludes with a review of the determinants of capital structure in light of the inefficiencies and distortions of the industry and the relationships observed.

This paper addresses the collusive nature of the ‘The Big Four’ which has led to a cartelized market in the auditing industry. They have taken advantage of the market concentration by charging excess auditing fees and making super-normal collusive profits. The paper puts light on the evidence and factors that have led to the sustainability of collusion in the auditing industry, after understanding the market structure of the auditing industry which is found to be Oligopolistic by nature. An analysis of this collusive behavior is understood through the lens of Game theory with the help of the Prisoner’s dilemma. We find that these firms cooperate with each other to raise prices, thereby enjoying the collusive profits amongst themselves. The incentives of the firms participating in a cartel is discussed along with the welfare consequences. We see that these firms in a cartelized market enjoy high profits and the consumer is negatively impacted (as the consumer surplus is reduced considerably compared to that in a perfect competition). In fact, the overall surplus (consumer surplus and producer surplus) is reduced and there is a reduction in the welfare of the society which is termed as ‘Deadweight loss’. This will also lead to reduction in economic efficiency as cartelized market is not Pareto efficient. Therefore, the government must step in and bring about regulations/policies to stop this kind of anti-competitive behavior. Price regulations, Antitrust laws, and Competition policies are recommended for the same.

Keywords: Collusion, The Big Four, Oligopoly, Game Theory, Cartelized market, Incentives, Welfare Consequences, and Policies.

The transition of the advertising market from traditional media to the internet has induced a proliferation of marketing agencies specialized in bidding in the auctions that are used to sell ad space on the web. We analyze how collusive bidding can emerge from bid delegation to a common marketing agency and how this can undermine the revenues and allocative efficiency of both the generalized second-price auction (GSP, used by Google, Microsoft Bing, and Yahoo!) and the Vickrey–Clarke–Groves (VCG) mechanism (used by Facebook). We find that despite its well-known susceptibility to collusion, the VCG mechanism outperforms the GSP auction in terms of both revenues and efficiency.

Polish economy experienced significant changes during the past 30 years. System transformation that be 2004 significantly influenced economic development. Apart from tough history experiences, they formed the shape of national economy which can be observed nowadays. It was a long and difficult process. During political and economic rapid changes greater numbers of price collusions and other illegal practices can be observed than during the stable development of national economy. Authors selected and reviewed the most important anti-competitive cases in the construction industry from the past 30 years in Poland. The review includes not only cases that were officially justified and penalized-like the collusion of portland cement big producers-but also cases of collusion suspicion on highway and express roads that ended with acquittal court verdicts. td. Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the Creative Construction Conference 2018.

La Direzione scientifica, espletata una prima sommaria valutazione dei lavori sottoposti per la pubblicazione, li avvia al referaggio o revisione scientifica tra pari (peer review), dopo aver espunto dal testo ogni elemento idoneo a consentire l'identificazione dell'autore o dell'autrice. Per ciascun lavoro (tranne che per i contributi della sezione dell'Osservatorio), la revisione scientifica viene affidata, con il metodo del "doppio cieco", ad uno studioso (referee) esterno alla Direzione scientifica ed alla Redazione della Rivista, e scelto sulla base della riconosciuta esperienza e competenza rispetto ai temi trattati nel lavoro stesso, nonché sulla base dell'assenza di conflitti d'interessi, da un lato, e di legami particolari (di parentela o affinità, di stretta amicizia, di colleganza nel medesimo Dipartimento o nella medesima Scuola accademica) con l'autore o con l'autrice, dall'altro. Il referee esprime entro il termine massimo di due settimane la propria valutazione positiva ovvero negativa in merito alla pubblicabilità del lavoro nella Rivista, compilando una scheda che viene inviata alla Direzione scientifica e all'Editore, i quali ne curano l'inoltro, in maniera anonima, all'autore/ autrice dell'articolo. Nel caso in cui la valutazione del referee risulti negativa, la Direzione scientifica della Rivista può comunque decidere di interpellare, con le medesime modalità del primo, un secondo referee. Le schede contenenti le valutazioni espresse dai referees vengono archiviate e conservate, anche in formato elettronico, a cura della Direzione della Rivista. In linea con le previsioni del Regolamento dell'ANVUR, in casi eccezionali, la Direzione può assumere direttamente la responsabilità della pubblicazione di singoli contributi mirati al lancio di una determinata proposta culturale ed il cui merito non è perciò assoggettabile ad una valutazione esterna, senza sottoporli a previa revisione scientifica, segnalando la circostanza e le relative motivazioni in una nota nella prima pagina del contributo.

Algorithmic collusion is a hot topic within antitrust circles in Europe, US and beyond. But some economists downplay algorithmic collusion as unlikely, if not impossible. This paper responds to these criticisms by pointing to new emerging evidence and the gap between law and this particular economic theory. We explain why algorithmic tacit collusion isn't only possible, but warrants the increasing concerns of many enforcers.

En la década de 1930 la Iglesia continuó el ambicioso proyecto de la recristianización de la sociedad, que buscaba a influir decididamente en la cultura y la política. La oportunidad de reescribir la Constitución dirigió la Iglesia a no organizar un partido confesional, sino a Liga Católica Electoral, para apoyar los candidatos que se comprometiesen con las demandas católicas, independientemente de sus asociaciones políticas. Esta posición se ha debilitado la capacidad de reaccionar frente del crecimiento exponencial de las extremas políticas. Al principio de 1935, la iglesia se ve ante la necesidad de tener que mantener su apartidismo y, al mismo tiempo, discernir una actitud ante el avanzar de las extremas sobre el clero y los laicos. Entonces permitiendo a la participación política de los que no estaban directamente involucrados en la administración de la Iglesia en el AIB, se ha abierto también la posibilidad del fascismo transformar el catolicismo.

The predominance of oligopolies in Latin American (Latam) markets poses an important challenge for competition authorities (CAs). In the first place, CAs must enforce competition laws in markets where it is difficult to distinguish between conducts

Polish economy experienced significant changes during the past 30 years. System transformation that began in the 1980's and was enhanced by Poland's entry to the European Union in 2004 significantly influenced economic development. Apart from tough history experiences, they formed the shape of national economy which can be observed nowadays. It was a long and difficult process. During political and economic rapid changes greater numbers of price collusions and other illegal practices can be observed than during the stable development of national economy. Authors selected and reviewed the most important anti-competitive cases in the construction industry from the past 30 years in Poland. The review includes not only cases that were officially justified and penalized-like the collusion of portland cement big producers-but also cases of collusion suspicion on highway and express roads that ended with acquittal court verdicts.

Non-competitive bids have recently become a major concern in both Public and Private sector construction contract auctions. Consequently, several models have been developed to help identify bidders potentially involved in collusive practices. However, most of these models require complex calculations and extensive information that is difficult to obtain.
The aim of this paper is to utilize recent developments for detecting abnormal bids in capped auctions (auctions with an upper bid limit set by the auctioner) and extend them to the more conventional uncapped auctions (where no such limits are set). To accomplish this, a new method is developed for estimating the values of bid distribution supports by using the solution to what has become known as the German tank problem. The model is then demonstrated and tested on a sample of real construction bid data and shown to detect cover bids with high accuracy.
This work contributes to an improved understanding of abnormal bid behavior as an aid to detecting and monitoring potential collusive bid practices.

Despite rising to stardom with her brilliant writings in Shanghai in the 1940s, Eileen Chang was criticised by the Leftist writers of her time and other later critics for failing to represent the general political panorama in China. In fact, they studied her works only with regard to the relations between her and China, but ignored the relationship between her, a writer of a semi-colonised nation, and the colonisers. However, through the analysis of her Chinese short story "Steamed Osmanthus Flower Ah Xiao's Unhappy Autumn" (1944) and her own translation of it into English entitled "Shame, Amah!" (1962) after her migration to the United States, this study explores how Chang resists colonialism through various means in the original text, and how such resistance is largely changed to collusion in the translation. The comparison between the source text and the translation reveals the dilemma of the diasporic writer -under the powerful domination of the host society, assimilation is inevitable; but at the same time, the writer is also trying hard to hold on to his or her own cultural traces.

This article considers the intersection of the themes of female antagonism, internalized dominance-as defined by E.J.R. David and Gail Pheterson-and female collusion with patriarchy in the oppression of incarcerated women in Chacón's La voz dormida (2002). Whereas many previous critics of the novel fittingly underscore the novelist's portrayal of the political and psychological solidarity of the Republican female inmates in the Ventas prison, this paper proposes that the cases of female antipathy among the female characters of Chacón's novel are symptomatic of, and helped contribute to, the Franco regime's widespread oppression of women in the postwar years. By likening her female antagonists to men, Chacón portrays the fascist-sympathizing women of the novel as agents of patriarchy, but more importantly, as accomplices to terror and even genocide. Diverging from the work of previous scholars, the author posits that Chacón highlights the (double) subjugation of all females-Republicans and Nationalists, nuns/wardens, and prisoners, alike-who were expected to comply with orthodox gender roles and male-defined moral codes, or risk being branded as moral transgressors and, in specific cases, losing any semblance of power they thought they had. This article offers new interpretative possibilities for a popular and highly glossed text.

A short few days in September 2020 saw an extraordinary turn of events. The Member States of the European Union used the withdrawal of a Member State from the European Union (EU) as a pretext to dismiss a sitting Advocate General (AG) of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) before the expiration of the duration of her mandate provided for in primary law. The Member States replaced her with another nominee in the absence of a vacancy. This occurred in direct violation of EU primary law, including the cardinal principles of security of tenure and judicial independence. The CJEU had the opportunity to prevent this from occurring; yet did absolutely nothing to prevent it. Instead, the CJEU went out of its way to facilitate the appointment of Mr. Athanasios Rantos in place of AG Eleanor Sharpston. The drama in Three Acts, involving numerous elements – hints of lawlessness; signs of complicity between the Member States and the CJEU; confirmation of the lack of structural independence of the CJEU – has ultimately raised doubts whether the CJEU is legally composed. These September 2020 developments resulted in the dismissal of a member of the Court that the Member States did not want, no matter what the law said. In this article, these cumulative events are analyzed systematically through a legal lens, regrettably confirming a startling omission in the EU legal order – that the EU lacks a structurally independent court of law sitting at its apex, and that the EU legal system is not immune to ultra vires Member State interventions. Notwithstanding these developments and a severe pounding to the credibility of the CJEU, there remains a possibility for this deficiency in the EU legal order to be rectified. The CJEU will have to state at some future juncture that decisions within the sphere of Article 253 TFEU are subject to judicial review for procedural irregularities, thus ensuring that the EU is truly a complete system of legal remedies and procedures. In the meantime, questions do linger about the lawful composition of the CJEU with the position of ‘AG’ Rantos in situ, which the CJEU should and must address.

‘System of the heavens’: an examination of the concept of ‘Collusion’ through the case study of the fundation of the AIB’s centre in the city of Natal

This article aims to rework the concept of Collusion through the recovery of its etymological roots and of its use by the astronomy in the early nineteenth century. Our goal is to allow the concept of Collusion can be used to articulate an investigation of Islamic extremism in the transnational level. For this purpose we will test our results through the case study provided by the relationship between Catholicism and fascism in the city of Natal, Brazil, in the interwar period.
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‘System of the heavens’: un análisis del concepto de ‘Colusión’ a través del caso de la creación del centro de la AIB en Natal

Este artículo tiene como objetivo volver a trabajar el concepto de colusión a través de la recuperación de sus raíces etimológicas y su uso en astronomía de principios del siglo XIX. Nuestro objetivo es permitir que el concepto de colusión puede servir a la articulación de un examen del extremismo islámico en el nivel transnacional. Para este fin se pondrá a prueba nuestros resultados a través del estudio de casos proporcionada por la relación entre el catolicismo y el fascismo en Natal, en el período de entreguerras.

Although several works have suggested that interlocking directorates are mechanisms that have the potential to facilitate collusion, few studies have investigated the matter empirically, and none have systematically considered known cartel cases. Taking a European perspective, and focusing on four different time periods, the present work investigates the extent to which companies that are directly and indirectly connected via interlocking directorships simultaneously or subsequently collude. Utilizing network analysis software the study provides a new method for identifying the two forms of business ties and possible overlaps between them. The analysis is based on an original dataset of European Community cartel cases and data on interlocking directorates developed by others. Very few examples are found of colluding companies that were previously directly or indirectly connected via interlocking directorates. This finding suggests that interlocking directorates rarely facilitate collusive activities.

Based on successful international examples of collusion detection, four indicators of the collusion have been chosen and analysed in this paper. The research was done for the majority of tender procedures in the road construction industry, in Poland that was finished in 2016 with the selection of a general contractor. Based on [1, 2, 3] the following four indicators were chosen: the number of offers placed in the tender procedure, the range of bid prices being offered, exactly the same set of offerors in a few tender procedures, repeating ordering the works execution to the same contractor in a given geographical region.

In the last decade, the historians that followed the theory of political religion have sought to overcome the ideologization of historiography to understand the relations between Catholicism and Fascism in the interwar period. Roger Griffin, Emilio Gentile and Renato Moro have sought to establish an analytic based on the idea of the radical incompatibility between christian religion and fascism, but observing the approximations made by catholics and fascists to amalgamate the contents of the religious and the political. This analytic, works around the concept of “collusion”, considers the problem posed by spatiality (the existence of centers of power, nation states, regional issues) and tries to discern the ideas and positions of the political and religious of the “collusive” groups. In this chapter, I will seek to illuminate the ‘collusion’ with the exam of the Brazilian case, showing how christian prayers like the "Apostles’ Creed" and ‘Hail Holy Queen’ were adapted in fascist texts and speeches in an attempt to create a hybrid of catholicism and fascism.

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As the contracts in the road construction sector in Poland are usually of extremely high value and financed from the state budget, the tender procedures should not allow for the non-concurrent behaviours of tender participants. Otherwise, the clients' losses will be of high value too. A database comprising hundreds of bidding procedures in the road construction industry in Poland has been developed. It includes the tenders' participants, the locations of the road sections, bids' values, the winners, and the types of roads. Every procedure has been evaluated and assigned to the set with a given level of collusion occurrence probability. The evaluation has required the analysis and the transformation of - described in the literature - collusive types of behaviours to the parameters of procedures that can be shown as numbers or ranks. Four criteria of a collusion threatened contracts have been chosen and applied for evaluation. Then, two methods of machine learning were app...

Efforts that come close to discovering a cartel but stop short of a positive identification may in fact reinforce a cartel rather than break it. Once discovered, cartels must be punished with utmost severity. Half-hearted punishments and "mere talk" against cartel activity may also end up strengthening a cartel. When a cartel member is unable to verify with certainty whether the other members are colluding, it may employ a decision rule that depends on its prior belief that the other firms are cheating. Briefly stated, prior mistrust raises the likelihood of a cartel breakdown. When the competition agency initiates investigation about cartel activity, it will increase the firms' level of certainty that there is little or no cheating. This effect can only be counterbalanced with sufficiently high fines. A positive identification of cartel activity not followed by a sufficiently large punishment will only act as an external reinforcement mechanism for the cartel. In fact, the cartel itself would find it difficult to create an equally efficient reinforcement mechanism. This kind of a competition policy reduces the competition authority into an agency whose only function is to ensure cartel formation and sustainability, as well as effective, efficient and costless maintenance of collusion. The Turkish cement cartel is discussed as a real-life example of these theoretical points. It is argued that enabling and encouraging harmed purchasers or sellers to collect damages from the cartel participants through private legal action can strengthen the deterrent effect of the Competition Authority's anti-cartel enforcement actions.

As an early pioneer of market-led institutional reforms and New Public Management policies, New Zealand arguably has one of the most 'neoliberalised' tertiary education sectors in the world. This article reports on a recent academic dispute concerning the attempt by management to introduce a new category of casualised academic employee within one of the country's largest research universities. It is based on a fi eldwork study, including document analysis, interviews and the participation of both authors in union and activist activities arising from the dispute. Whilst some academics may collude in the new regimes of governance that these reforms have created, we suggest that 'collusion' and 'resistance' are inadequate terms for explaining how academic behaviour and subjectivities are being reshaped in the modern neoliberal university. We argue for a more theoretically nuanced and situational account that acknowledges the wider legal and systemic constraints that these reforms have created. To do this, we problematise the concept of collusion and reframe it according to three different categories: 'conscious complicity', 'unwitting complicity' and 'coercive complicity'. We ask, what happens when one must 'collude' in order to resist, or when certain forms of opposition are rendered impossible by the terms of one's employment contract? We conclude by refl ecting on ways in which academics understand and engage with the policies of university managers in contexts where changes to the framework governing employment relations have rendered conventional forms of resistance increasingly problematic, if not illegal.

We propose a political-economics model of decentralization (by the central govern-
ment) and collusion (between the local government and .rms) to explain high death
rates in the coalmine industry in China, where the local government allows the firms
to choose dangerous but profitable modes of production when collusion is feasible. Our model predicts that coalmine death rates are increasing in decentralization and collusion and decreasing in media exposure. We collect a provincial level panel dataset from 1995 to 2005 and compare the decentralization period (1998 to 2000) with the adjacent centralization periods. Consistent with the model, we find that decentralization increases death rates by about 30%. Assuming that the transaction costs of collusion are lower for native Safety governors (the o¢ cials responsible for safety regulations) and using within-governor estimations, we find that the intraction between nativeness and decentralization increases death rates by about 100%. We proxy media exposure by the number of newspaper names and find that it has a negative impact on death rates. In addition, we match the province-level data with the balance-sheet data of coalmine firms between 1998 and 2005 and provide additional evidence using these firm-level data.

The present research is to analyze the impacts generated in the dairy industry, particularly in the segment of whole milk: 1) Acquiring Aeroméxico by LALA 3) Strategies to be implemented by LALA and remain a leader 3) Femsa's foray in the dairy industry with the acquisition of Santa Clara and 4) the assumption of possible collusion with Santa Clara Alpura to address the high level of competition generated by LALA. It is important to know the structure of this market, analyze the system of regulated prices in the milk to understand the changes that will be in the coming years with these three big companies that compete to achieve hegemony in the milk market.

This paper considers retailers' pricing strategies when they sell both nationally-advertised brands and quality-equivalent Ž . private-label brands a form of store, house or own-label branding . We investigate the impact of advertising on the ability of Ž . retailers to increase profitability across all brands. Supporting recent theoretical arguments though contradicting others , our industry study reveals that retailers can react to the heavy advertising amongst national brands by increasing prices, revenues, and economic profits generated from both national brands and private-label brands. For the category studied, retailers' strategies may include setting collusive prices for both national brands and private-label brands. We use a structural test to support this conclusion. Management interviews further support this finding. q

Despite rising to stardom with her brilliant writings in Shanghai in the 1940s, Eileen Chang was criticised by the Leftist writers of her time and other later critics for failing to represent the general political panorama in China. In fact, they studied her works only with regard to the relations between her and China, but ignored the relationship between her, a writer of a semi-colonised nation, and the colonisers. However, through the analysis of her Chinese short story "Steamed Osmanthus Flower Ah Xiao's Unhappy Autumn" (1944) and her own translation of it into English entitled "Shame, Amah!" (1962) after her migration to the United States, this study explores how Chang resists colonialism through various means in the original text, and how such resistance is largely changed to collusion in the translation. The comparison between the source text and the translation reveals the dilemma of the diasporic writer -under the powerful domination of the host society, assimilation is inevitable; but at the same time, the writer is also trying hard to hold on to his or her own cultural traces.

We identify and analyze three distinct effects arising from potentially binding budget constraints in multi-unit ascending auctions. First, binding budgets clearly reduce the level of competition among bidders. Second, budget constraints may at the same time make it difficult to sustain collusive equilibria when bidders lack sufficient resources to punish defectors.Third, the mere possibility, even if arbitrarily small, of binding budget constraints can reduce competition substantially because bidders can pretend to be constrained, even if they are not.In this cases, measures restricting the participation of low-budget bidders, e.g. reserve prices, can increase social welfare.

Previously secret British state archives prove "a high-level, coordinated, and sustained plot" by the British Army, Royal Ulster Constabulary, and Senior Civil Servants to deceive the two Parliaments of Stormont and Westminster about the truth of the McGurk’s Bar Massacre.

This booklet follows years of archival research and information battles against the British state and has lead to a complaint to the British Cabinet Secretary and a request for an immediate investigation.

The transition of the advertising market from traditional media to the internet has
induced proliferation of marketing agencies specialized in bidding in the auctions
that are used to sell ad space on the web. We analyze how collusive bidding can emerge
from bid delegation to a common marketing agency and how this can undermine the
revenues and allocative efficiency of both the Generalized Second Price auction (GSP,
used by Google and Microsoft-Bing and Yahoo!) and the of VCG mechanism (used by
Facebook). We nd that, despite its well-known susceptibility to collusion, the VCG
mechanism outperforms the GSP auction both in terms of revenues and efficiency.

Based on successful international examples of collusion detection, four indicators of the collusion have been chosen and analysed in this paper. The research was done for the majority of tender procedures in the road construction industry, in Poland that was finished in 2016 with the selection of a general contractor. Based on [1, 2, 3] the following four indicators were chosen: the number of offers placed in the tender procedure, the range of bid prices being offered, exactly the same set of offerors in a few tender procedures, repeating ordering the works execution to the same contractor in a given geographical region.

The purpose of this study is to analyze the consequences that point score systems in association football may have on potential collusion between teams. The study applies game theory and empirical analysis to derive and test hypotheses. The main findings of the article include Nash equilibria indicating a higher collusion potential associated with the 3-1-0 point score system than with the 2-1-0 system. Of particular interest is the finding that the competitive balance of the league affects collusion, and that (theoretically) high competitive balance in fact makes collusion more probable. Empirically, we are not able to prove that real-world participants do collude, but we provide circumstantial evidence that is consistent with collusion. The empirical analysis is based on a sample of 25 European top leagues with 823 played matches in the 2017 and 2016/17 seasons. These data are used to estimate uncertainty of outcome and draw ratio. We apply a standard t-test to test our main hypothesis. The main conclusion of the paper may hence be summed up as advice to reinstall the 2-1-0 point score system in association football.

La colusión entre competidores económicos se considera un problema grave en la economía chilena. Los carteles aumentan precios y así dañan a los consumidores, y limitan la innovación y el crecimiento económico. La Ley de Defensa de la Libre Competencia de Chile (Decreto de Ley N° 211, 1973) prohíbe la colusión, pero históricamente no se ha observado una implementación eficaz de esta normativa para evitar la formación y el funcionamiento de los carteles. Las modificaciones a esta ley (2003 y 2009) mejoraron y revitalizaron la política anti-carteles en el país al aumentar las multas, introducir el programa de delación compensada y otorgar facultades intrusivas de investigación a la Fiscalía Nacional Económica (FNE). La reforma de 2016 introduce sanciones más severas, incluyendo penas de cárcel e inhabilitación de los cartelistas para ocupar cargos de director o gerente de una sociedad anónima abierta, con el objetivo de disuadir la colusión y fortalecer el programa de delación compensada, para aumentar la probabilidad de detección de los carteles.

Transnational corporations (TNCs) have been driving forces behind promoting policies aimed at protecting and further intensifying competition in global markets. This article aims to examine the extent to which leading European TNCs that have promoted such policies have been involved in cartels. To this end, the article focuses on companies associated with the European Roundtable of Industrialists (ERT), a highly influential network consisting of top executives from a range of Europe's largest TNCs that has consistently urged political decision-makers to give companies the 'freedom to compete'. We find that a third of these companies were convicted for participating in cartels between 1990 and 2010. Drawing on critical political economy scholarship, it is concluded that this behaviour may not be paradoxical.

This paper uses auction theory, incorporating buyer asymmetry, to analyse the structure of a small market for parmal paddy in North India and to assess the implications of alternative government policies. Our results suggest that two buyers collude in this market; we are able to quantify the extent to which prices are depressed as a consequence. Such collusion probably characterizes many small grain markets in India. Government intervention in grain markets in India is pervasive, and has in recent years led to its acquiring excessive food stocks and an unwillingness to enforce the support price. Using simulations, we demonstrate that while reducing the support price for paddy may not have the desired effect of reducing government purchases, a decrease in the percentage that millers are required to sell as levy to the government will.

Cloud computing has become a part of people's lives. However, there are many unresolved problems with security of this technology. According to the assessment of international experts in the field of security, there are risks in the appearance of cloud collusion in uncertain conditions. To mitigate this type of uncertainty, and minimize data redundancy of encryption together with harms caused by cloud collusion, modified threshold Asmuth-Bloom and weighted Mignotte secret sharing schemes are used. We show that if the villains do know the secret parts, and/or do not know the secret key, they cannot recuperate the secret. If the attackers do not know the required number of secret parts but know the secret key, the probability that they obtain the secret depends the size of the machine word in bits that is less than 1/2 ((l-1)). We demonstrate that the proposed scheme ensures security under several types of attacks. We propose four approaches to select weights for secret sharing sc...

A 'collusion puzzle' exists by which, even though increasing the number of firms reduces the ability to tacitly collude, and leads to a collapse in collusion in experimental markets with four or more firms, in natural markets there are such numbers of firms colluding successfully. We present an experiment showing that, if managers are deferential towards an authority, firms can induce more collusion by delegating production decisions to middle managers and providing suitable informal nudges. This holds not only with two but also with four firms. We are also able to distinguish compliance effects from coordination effects from the nudges.

Past allocations of coal blocks, in India, being marred with controversies on the grounds of being arbitrary and discretionary led to the de-allotment of 204 coal blocks by the Supreme Court in 2014. Since then, auctions and competitive bidding were introduced in the allocation of coal blocks. Now bidder collusion is a pervasive problem and has been addressed throughout theoretical and empirical academic literature. In auctions, bidders may set up a cartel, or a bidding ring, with the aim of increasing their profit at the expense of the seller and ultimately lower the efficiency of resource allocation. This paper makes theoretical comments on the auction format determined by the Government of India, based on the current regulations and stipulations, regarding it being collusion-proof. It is observed that the prior-allottee (PA) firms face a higher effective entry cost due to the levy component than the new-allottee (NA) firms. This creates a contradictory situation. Without this skewed cost distribution, the PA firms have an incentive to collude against the NA firms whereas with this differential treatment the NA firms have an incentive to collude against the PA firms. This calls for empirical investigation into the optimality of entry costs.

Keywords; coal block auction, collusion in auctions, optimal entry cost, entry deterrence.

Supervisor - Dr. Soumendu Sarkar, Assistant Professor, Department of Policy Studies, TERI University.

As the contracts in the road construction sector in Poland are usually of extremely high value and financed from the state budget, the tender procedures should not allow for the non-concurrent behaviours of tender participants. Otherwise, the clients' losses will be of high value too. A database comprising hundreds of bidding procedures in the road construction industry in Poland has been developed. It includes the tenders' participants, the locations of the road sections, bids' values, the winners, and the types of roads. Every procedure has been evaluated and assigned to the set with a given level of collusion occurrence probability. The evaluation has required the analysis and the transformation of -  described in the literature - collusive types of behaviours to the parameters of procedures that can be shown as numbers or ranks. Four criteria of a collusion threatened contracts have been chosen and applied for evaluation. Then, two methods of machine learning were applied. The first method was to train an artificial neural network (ANN) to classify the procedures to the aforementioned sets. The other method was to utilize artificial neural networks predictive capabilities enriched by the fuzzy sets theory. The multiple output from ANN was defined as membership function values. The use of the fuzzy sets theory - the process of defuzzification - helps to classify the tender procedures to the sets of different level of risk (of collusion appearance). The results achieved in these two separate processes are compared and discussed. The created tool can be applied for the future tender procedures as a pre-test of a collusion appearance.

The paper first briefly reviews the extent to which profit maximising transport firms with identical cost functions and producing identical transport services pass-on output taxes to transport users under perfect competition, under different forms of imperfect competition and when they act as monopolists. Then the analysis is extended to derive the pass-on rates and activity reductions caused by an output tax when firms care both about profit and consumer surplus, produce symmetrically differentiated services and compete simultaneously in quantities and fare and when they collude. The pass-on rates and activity reductions are highest under collusion and lowest under Cournot competition when they produce complementary services. When they produce substitute services, the result is ambiguous and the competitive situation that yields highest pass-on depends on the firms’ objective functions and how fiercely they compete. Two important counterintuitive results are that the more intensely the firms compete and the more weight they put on consumer surplus, the higher the pass-on rates are.

The study presents a survey of research results on the development of cartel
collusion indicators in the framework of public procurement, which are based on the
structural characteristics of the industry and the behavioral traits of economic agents.
An overview of the methods used to identify cartel collusions. The paper shows and
reveals the internal and external factors affecting the behavior of bidders. Methods and
tools for identifying and preventing cartel collusion by participants in public
procurement are suggested

This study concludes that the rise of corruption, collusion, and nepotism in the time of the Prophet Muḥammad comes from a variety of special terms and is contained in ḥadīth. These emerging terms affect the different usage associations of each term. The method used in this research is analytical and descriptive method. This study uses two approaches. The first approach used in the research is the 'ilm al-Ḥadīth approach. This approach is used to measure ḥadīth-ḥadīth relating to corruption, collusion and nepotism in terms of quality of matan and sanad; and its asbāb al-Wurūd. The second approach is the linguistic approach. This approach is enabled to explore the rationality of corruption, collusion, and nepotism through tradition, systematics, and language tendencies in producing an understanding. This research has several objectives. Firstly, to authenticate corruption, collusion, and nepotism as disciplinary and inconsistent attitudes that can be present in human beings without being limited by the dimension of time and space. Secondly, to verify and measure the existence of cases of corruption, collusion, and nepotism in the time of Mu'ammad ibn 'Abdillāh by analyzing the matan al-Ḥadīth, Sharh al-Ḥadīth, and asbāb al-Wurūd. Thirdly, inventory the terms of corruption, collusion, and nepotism in ḥadīth and map their usage. Keywords: Corruption, Collusion, Nepotism, and Ḥadīth

An Ad hoc Network is a pool of wireless mobile nodes energetically forming a network without the use of any pre-accessible network infrastructure or centralized administrator. These nodes communicate with each other by hop-to-hop communication. This dynamic topology of mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs) allows nodes to get attached and leave the network at any second of time. Thus MANET can be used in a variety of fields. Current MANETs are designed primary for military utility. This generic characteristic of MANET has rendered its vulnerability to security attacks. Due to which unprotected attacks of the malicious nodes can occur at any time. This paper focuses on one such attack known as " Black hole attack " and the routing protocol being used here is AODV.

Efforts that come close to discovering a cartel but stop short of a positive identification may in fact reinforce a cartel rather than break it. Once discovered, cartels must be punished with utmost severity. Half-hearted punishments and "mere talk" against cartel activity may also end up strengthening a cartel. When a cartel member is unable to verify with certainty whether the other members are colluding, it may employ a decision rule that depends on its prior belief that the other firms are cheating. Briefly stated, prior mistrust raises the likelihood of a cartel breakdown. When the competition agency initiates investigation about cartel activity, it will increase the firms' level of certainty that there is little or no cheating. This effect can only be counterbalanced with sufficiently high fines. A positive identification of cartel activity not followed by a sufficiently large punishment will only act as an external reinforcement mechanism for the cartel. In fact, the cartel itself would find it difficult to create an equally efficient reinforcement mechanism. This kind of a competition policy reduces the competition authority into an agency whose only function is to ensure cartel formation and sustainability, as well as effective, efficient and costless maintenance of collusion. The Turkish cement cartel is discussed as a real-life example of these theoretical points. It is argued that enabling and encouraging harmed purchasers or sellers to collect damages from the cartel participants through private legal action can strengthen the deterrent effect of the Competition Authority's anti-cartel enforcement actions.