Dominik Schober

Static vs. Dynamic Impacts of Unbundling – Electricity Markets in South America

Ownership unbundling and third party access are discussed as two options of unbundling in both the literature and political discussions. Focusing on the South American electricity sector, I contrast static and dynamic impacts of ownership unbundling and third party access regimes on customer prices. Substantially different results are found using dynamic rather than static analysis. In particular, negative short term effects of ownership unbundling found in static models are approximately cancelled out by subsequent positive impacts in the dynamic model. Third party access seems to allow for similar benefits while avoiding the (restructuring) costs of ownership unbundling. Previously estimated static models thus appear to suffer from either omitted variable biases or endogeneity problems of static non-difference models.

Disentangling irregular cycles in economic time series

Cycles play an important role when analyzing market phenomena. In many markets, both overlaying (weekly, seasonal or business cycles) and time-varying cycles (e.g. asymmetric lengths of peak and off peak or variation of business cycle length) exist simultaneously. Identification of these market cycles is crucial and no standard detection procedure exists to disentangle them. We introduce and investigate an adaptation of an endogenous structural break test for detecting at the same time simultaneously overlaying as well as time-varying cycles. This is useful for growth or business cycle analysis as well as for analysis of complex strategic behavior and short-term dynamics.

Refinancing under yardstick regulation with investment cycles: The case of long-lived electricity network assets

In the context of yardstick regulation with long-lived assets, the influence of investment cycles and thereof resulting heterogeneous capital structures on the ability to recover capital is quite important. Investment decisions are based on whole investment cycles of the infrastructure. It is shown in this article that variable lifetimes of assets may cause substantial problems of capital-recovery under an efficient firm standard yardstick regulation based on historic (straight-line) depreciation. Resulting heterogeneous investment and cost cycles may cause instantaneous yardstick levels below the long-run refinancing level. Recovery is neither possible in later periods because of the efficient firm standard. An illustrating empirical example is used to demonstrate the relevance of the problem. Finally, two alternatives, branch average cost yardstick determination and correction factors based on the share of capital under depreciation, are discussed.

Political reform in electricity markets — A dynamic panel approach applied to South America

This article uses dynamic panel data analysis to examine the impacts of regulatory reforms in the electricity sector. We find that short term negative effects of ownership unbundling are approximately cancelled out by later positive impacts. Third party access seems to allow taking the benefits but avoiding the costs of ownership unbundling. The implementation of electricity exchanges has a positive impact on end user prices and thus appears to reveal real costs and risk of electricity production. The independency of regulatory authorities shows to have lagged price decreasing influence. Further, market coupling activities in South America, the object under study, seem to merit further expansion.