Regulation

Congressional attempts to ban cryptocurrency platforms from providing yield, or interest, on stablecoin holdings have so far failed, and will likely continue to fail, as long as they run up against economic logic, writes David Krause.

In new research, Ben Bates examines the recent wave of funds designed to open private markets to retail investors. Such funds both underreport volatility and perform worse than comparable funds aimed at wealthier investors.

The EU’s proposed Digital Omnibus to simplify digital regulation suggests repealing the 2019 Platform-to-Business Regulation. This poses a problem for the Digital Markets Act, which relies on the P2B-Regulation for how to define core platform services like search engines. Moving forward with the repeal will require legislators to renegotiate first the DMA, which is necessary anyways to adapt the law to the age of artificial intelligence, writes Jan-Frederick Göhsl.

Recent border carbon measures have relied on the theory that stricter environmental rules in rich countries push pollution-intensive production toward developing economies with weaker regulations. In new research, Irfan Saleem and Giray Gozgor show that the “pollution haven” mechanism is neither automatic nor uniform across industries. Evidence is mixed, often small in magnitude, and highly sensitive to how we measure regulation, model trade, and account for industry mobility.

Matt Lucky reviews Jonathan D. Cohen’s new book, Losing Big: America's Reckless Bet on Sports Gambling.

In new research, Sureyya Burcu Avci, Cindy Schipani, and H. Nejat Seyhun assess and justify the United States Securities and Exchange Commission’s failed attempts to regulate potential fraud and deception in the private equity market by examining the performance and potential conflicts-of-interest in de-SPAC transactions.

In two new research papers, Ryan Brutger and Amy Pond explore how different messaging about the effects of  antitrust enforcement sway American public opinion toward and away from stronger enforcement.

In recent research, Brian Broughman, Matthew Wansley, and Samuel Weinstein examine how startups are changing their traditional exit strategies in response to more stringent antitrust enforcement. Many startups are adopting alternative strategies to stay private longer, ultimately raising new questions for competition policy. 

In a new NBER working paper, Charles Hodgson and Shilong Sun show that vertical integration is usually good for consumers, except when firms have both the ability and the incentive to foreclose rivals.  They use the heavily integrated Chinese Film Industry to show that targeting enforcement to the markets where harm is predictable makes it possible to effectively regulate harmful cases and protect consumers.

In new research, Seda Basihos investigates the relationship between a decline in market competition and global democratic backsliding. She finds that market concentration leads to increasing political power for giant firms—a trend that ultimately erodes democracy levels.