Price matching and platform pricing

In this study we investigate the effects of Price Matching Guarantees (PMGs) commercial policies on U.S. online consumer electronics daily prices. By applying a Diff-in-Diff identification strategy we find evidence in favor of price reductions occurring after the PMG policy is repealed. We further investigate if such effect is heterogeneous according to products characteristics, by exploiting User Generated Contents (UGCs, as products popularity and quality) and online search visibility measures (Google Search Rank). Estimates suggest that for high quality (visibility) products PMGs policies harms competition by keeping prices high, while for low quality (visibility) products, prices decrease during the policy validity period.