Re: Microeconomics of cornering

[Michael Pollak <mpollak@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 1 Aug 2003, Eugene Coyle wrote:

> Are you thinking of "cornering" per se or simply gaming markets?

I guess neither "cornering" nor "gaming" nor "fixing" exactly describes
what I'm interested in.  I'm interested specifically in raising the price
of a commodity by restricting how much you supply in cases where you (and
your friends) don't have a monopoly, but where tightness of the market can
give you a temporary leverage similar to that exercised by a monopolist.
But one you lose as the market gets slack again.

This seems to me the power of Opec.  And if it is, I've yet to see it
modelled clearly.  I've only seen it described as a monopoly, as if market
demand didn't matter, or as a chimera, helpless in the face of the market.

Michael