Agenda Archive | Page 2 of 61

Digital platform regulation: What are the proposals across Europe?

December 2019

Calls to ‘do something’ about tech giants are getting louder. Some suggest that breaking them up is the best way to go, but such strong intervention is absent from the most developed regulatory proposals seen so far. Taking into account recent prominent reports from (or for) the European Commission and several national competition authorities, what are the main proposals on the table, and are they plausible?

Conduct risk management—high five?

December 2019

Financial services providers around Europe are subject to clear expectations from regulators regarding conduct risk (or ‘the risk of misconduct’ that can cause poor consumer outcomes or undermine market stability or competition). What are these expectations, and how can providers meet them? In our experience, managing conduct risk requires a new toolkit based on behavioural economics, business model analysis, machine learning, competition economics, and good governance.

All for broadband and broadband for all

December 2019

In the run-up to last week’s UK General Election, the main political parties supplemented headline-grabbing policy announcements around Brexit policies and the NHS with outlines of their plans for supporting investment in key national infrastructure. Among the announcements were those in support of ensuring that all homes and businesses should have access to very high capacity broadband. With the Conservative Party now in power and promising to deliver gigabit-capable networks for all by 2025, we ask how can this be achieved?

Ofwat’s PR19 Final Determinations

December 2019

Ofwat published its final determinations (FDs) for the England and Wales water sector at 07.00 on 16 December 2019. There are many documents and a lot of detail that the industry will need to pore over in order to understand the implications. Here we explore the three main contentious issues in the sector: finance, cost efficiency and outcome delivery incentives (ODIs). We take an initial look at what has changed since the draft determinations (DDs), published earlier in the year.

How does social media shape purposeful business?

December 2019

Society is playing a growing role in shaping the way that businesses operate. Reflecting this, have become platforms to highlight good and bad business practice and help people coordinate responses. To what extent does this pressure influence core business operations? —and therefore the future of business? Tim Hogg, a behavioural economist at Oxera, takes a look at the role of social media in the context of thinking Beyond the Bottom Line.

Investment promises from politicians—should we believe them?

December 2019

As the UK general election approaches, voters are being seduced by promises from all the parties about how much they will invest in improving the nation’s infrastructure over the next Parliament. What should we make of these promises? This question is not just about political credibility (or even honesty); it has a hard economic edge. The injection of a slew of new major and minor projects would have implications for the quality of public services, employment, inflation, taxation and government debt. It is worth asking ourselves how much of this spending will actually happen—and when.

What are firms for? Redefining corporate purpose

November 2019

What should be the purpose of a firm? To maximise profits or shareholder value, or to pursue wider societal objectives? Professor Julian Franks of London Business School, and Oxera Partner, discusses the roles of trust and implicit contracts in redefining corporate purpose. He looks at changes that may be required in regulated utilities, with a focus on water

Political control of state-owned utilities in the UK

November 2019

The UK Labour Party’s proposal to nationalise core utilities has renewed debate about whether nationalisation is a good or a bad thing. Tim Tutton, Associate at the Centre for Competition Policy (University of East Anglia, UK), takes a different approach. Focusing on the issue of political control, he explores whether lessons can be learned—from both the nationalised era and the privatised era—and how any future (potential) nationalisations might be made to work more effectively than in the past

Unbundling: what’s the impact on equity research?

November 2019

The EU’s second Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID II), introduced in January 2018, requires brokers to charge separate fees for trade execution and for research, thereby ‘unbundling’ them. Since these rules came into force, there have been concerns about their impact on the provision of research and, more generally, the development of capital markets. What market failures does the unbundling rule intend to address, and what are its potential unintended consequences?

Why is Black Friday growing in Europe?

November 2019

Black Friday was born in the USA, but recent years have seen the sales event become a phenomenon in Europe. Across Belgium, France, Germany, Italy the Netherlands, and the UK, sales on Black Friday are now over double the...

What is the purpose of business?

November 2019

Why are so many firms insisting on telling us what their ‘purpose’ is? David Jevons, Oxera Partner, has been looking at the role of business in today’s society and discusses the purpose of a corporate purpose. Since the 1970s, introductory economics and finance classes have taught that the purpose of a firm is to maximise shareholder wealth; yet today, some of the most successful and high-profile firms are keen to communicate a different purpose.

What is the role of the consumer in purpose-led business?

November 2019

A monthly podcast debating what it means to go Beyond the Bottom Line. Featuring Oxera experts and leaders in business and finance.