Trade and Linked Exchange; Price Discrimination Through Transaction Bundling

In this paper we try to explain how price discrimination can cause bilateral trade patterns of the type seen under countertrade agreements. We interpret countertrade as a form of transaction bundling which can discriminate between potential trading partners and we combine characteristics from both explanations as to the existence of countertrade. There is both price discrimination through transaction bundling, and informational asymmetry in the form of uncertainty in the quality of the goods produced by trading partners in less developed countries (LDCs) leading to a partner preference from the side of the Western (DC) firm. Our paper shows that although the ability of firms in LDCs to overcome their creditworthiness constraints by engaging in countertrade arrangements may be restricted by this quality uncertainty as it reduces the willingness of a firm in a DC to exchange, the trade volume prospects of a firm in a LDC can be considerably enhanced if a countertrade transaction does occur. Our paper goes beyond the case of linked exchange, which is only one of the three cases of transaction bundling examined. The other two cases are that of the Western firm being a monopoly selling a bundle of two goods used as a benchmark case, and the more interesting case of the Western firm being the buyer of two goods and setting both two separate buying prices and a bundling (i.e. package) purchase price. Many procurement decisions are not simply a matter of price, but also the identity and reputation of the supplier matters, especially when the supplier is located in an LDC. We show than when bundling its purchases, the Western firm buyer will be willing to offer a bundled price greater than the sum of the two separate prices, as the option of a bundled purchase would increase its pro…ts even if there are no complementarities between the goods bundled. In our model the argument is that just as it is profitable for a monopolist to offer mixed bundling at a bundled price which is lower than the sum of the individual prices (hence exploiting the average willingness to pay), it is also profitable for a monopsonist to offer a bundled purchase price which is higher that the sum of the individual prices on offer (hence exploiting the average willingness to sell). Equally interestingly, it is found that a LDC can substantially increase its sales of a good with a high degree of quality uncertainty by being offered to bundle it with the sale of a more basic good with a low degree of quality uncertainty

Lower bounds to energy eigenvalues for the stark effect in a rigid rotator

Lower bounds to energy eigenvalues for rigid rotator in electric field Stark effect calculation - Schroedinger equatio

Nanoscale austenite reversion through partitioning, segregation, and kinetic freezing: Example of a ductile 2 GPa Fe-Cr-C steel

Austenite reversion during tempering of a Fe-13.6Cr-0.44C (wt.%) martensite results in an ultrahigh strength ferritic stainless steel with excellent ductility. The austenite reversion mechanism is coupled to the kinetic freezing of carbon during low-temperature partitioning at the interfaces between martensite and retained austenite and to carbon segregation at martensite-martensite grain boundaries. An advantage of austenite reversion is its scalability, i.e., changing tempering time and temperature tailors the desired strength-ductility profiles (e.g. tempering at 400{\deg}C for 1 min. produces a 2 GPa ultimate tensile strength (UTS) and 14% elongation while 30 min. at 400{\deg}C results in a UTS of ~ 1.75 GPa with an elongation of 23%). The austenite reversion process, carbide precipitation, and carbon segregation have been characterized by XRD, EBSD, TEM, and atom probe tomography (APT) in order to develop the structure-property relationships that control the material's strength and ductility.Comment: in press Acta Materialia 201

The definability criterions for convex projective polyhedral reflection groups

Following Vinberg, we find the criterions for a subgroup generated by reflections \Gamma \subset \SL^{\pm}(n+1,\mathbb{R}) and its finite-index subgroups to be definable over $\mathbb{A}$ where $\mathbb{A}$ is an integrally closed Noetherian ring in the field $\mathbb{R}$. We apply the criterions for groups generated by reflections that act cocompactly on irreducible properly convex open subdomains of the $n$-dimensional projective sphere. This gives a method for constructing injective group homomorphisms from such Coxeter groups to \SL^{\pm}(n+1,\mathbb{Z}). Finally we provide some examples of \SL^{\pm}(n+1,\mathbb{Z})-representations of such Coxeter groups. In particular, we consider simplicial reflection groups that are isomorphic to hyperbolic simplicial groups and classify all the conjugacy classes of the reflection subgroups in \SL^{\pm}(n+1,\mathbb{R}) that are definable over $\mathbb{Z}$. These were known by Goldman, Benoist, and so on previously.Comment: 31 pages, 8 figure

Necessary and sufficient conditions for bipartite entanglement

Necessary and sufficient conditions for bipartite entanglement are derived, which apply to arbitrary Hilbert spaces. Motivated by the concept of witnesses, optimized entanglement inequalities are formulated solely in terms of arbitrary Hermitian operators, which makes them useful for applications in experiments. The needed optimization procedure is based on a separability eigenvalue problem, whose analytical solutions are derived for a special class of projection operators. For general Hermitian operators, a numerical implementation of entanglement tests is proposed. It is also shown how to identify bound entangled states with positive partial transposition.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figur

Dark matter halo response to the disk growth

We consider the sensitivity of the circular-orbit adiabatic contraction approximation to the baryon condensation rate and the orbital structure of dark matter halos in the $\Lambda$CDM paradigm. Using one-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations including the dark matter halo mass accretion history and gas cooling, we demonstrate that the adiabatic approximation is approximately valid even though halos and disks may assemble simultaneously. We further demonstrate the validity of the simple approximation for $\Lambda$CDM halos with isotropic velocity distributions using three-dimensional N-body simulations. This result is easily understood: an isotropic velocity distribution in a cuspy halo requires more circular orbits than radial orbits. Conversely, the approximation is poor in the extreme case of a radial orbit halo. It overestimates the response a core dark matter halo, where radial orbit fraction is larger. Because no astronomically relevant models are dominated by low-angular momentum orbits in the vicinity of the disk and the growth time scale is never shorter than a dynamical time, we conclude that the adiabatic contraction approximation is useful in modeling the response of dark matter halos to the growth of a disk.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA