Why Parallel Trade May Raise Producers’
Pro…ts1
Horst Ra¤
Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre
Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel
D-24098 Kiel, Germany
Email: ra¤@econ-theory.uni-kiel.de
Nicolas Schmitt
Département d’économie politique
Université de Genève
CH- 1211 Genève 4, Switzerland
Email: schmitt@ecopo.unige.ch
February 2005

1 We thank Frank Stähler and seminar participants for useful comments.

The
authors acknowledge …nancial support from the Social Sciences and Humanities
Research Council of Canada and from the Transcoop Program of the Alexandervon-Humboldt Foundation and the German Ministry of Education.

Abstract
This paper shows that a manufacturer may bene…t from parallel trade. In
addition to an intuitive condition about the e¤ect of demand shocks, thisoccurs when competitive retailers must order inventories before they know
the realization of demand and for products whose sale value drops at the endof the demand period. For these types of products, letting retailers tradeunsold inventories generally results in larger orders placed with the manufacturer, higher manufacturer pro…t and higher consumer surplus. The model
provides a simple explanation as to why the volume of parallel trade is now
very large and accepted by manufacturers for some products such as automobiles, clothes, toys, consumer electronics, musical recordings, cosmetics andperfumes.
JEL classi…cation: F12
Keywords: parallel trade, distribution

1

Introduction

The purpose of this paper is to show that circumstances exist under which
it pays a manufacturer to allow distributors (hereafter called retailers) toengage in parallel trade, that is trade that is not directly controlled by thetrademark, the copyright or the patent owner, generally the manufacturer
himself. Moreover parallel trade in these circumstances is generally welfare
improving.
These results arise when four conditions are met. The …rst two are about
the nature of the product. Retailers must place orders before they know thestate of demand and the products have little value at the end of the demand
period (or equivalently, it is costly to maintain them as inventories). The
other two conditions are about the demand. The states of demand must bedi¤erent across markets and di¤erent states of demand a¤ect the quantity
demanded rather than consumer’s willingness to pay for the products.
There are several markets for which the conditions about the nature of
the market apply. Many markets (for instance, automobiles, motorcycles,
clothes) require manufacturers to introduce new models frequently. Other
markets, such as toys, have very narrow and well-de…ned demand periods(e.g., pre-Christmas season). In all these cases, the value of the products
decreases signi…cantly at the end of the demand period. Moreover, many
goods are not produced on a just-in-time inventory basis and exploiting scaleeconomies often requires signi…cant lags between production and sales. In
other words, orders must be placed well before the relevant demand period.
This often leads to errors in forecasting the future strength of demand andthus ex post to incentives to ship unsold inventories to markets where demandturns out to be higher than expected.
To understand why a manufacturer may have an incentive to allow thistype of parallel trade, suppose it does not and is able to e¤ectively ban
parallel trade. Retailers may then be stuck with signi…cant unsold inventories
in which case they have a strong incentive to lower prices. Competition
among retailers might even force the price to drop to zero as inventories
are essentially sunk investments. Anticipating a possible loss, retailers will
be reluctant to order large inventories. Banning parallel trade may thus
have detrimental e¤ects on the manufacturer’s pro…tability. Allowing parallel
trade, on the other hand, constitutes a simple mechanism by which the retailprice does not fall dramatically when the state of the demand turns out tobe low and it provides incentives to retailers to place larger orders than they1otherwise would.
Is there evidence that manufacturers like parallel trade? Data on parallel
trade are notoriously hard to come by, simply because trade statistics do not
distinguish between authorized and unauthorized intermediaries (Maskus,
2000). However, the volume of parallel trade has simply become too large
to argue seriously that manufacturers either do not know of its existence orknow about it but are unable to stop it even if it lowers their pro…tability. In
other words, manufacturers must bene…t from parallel trade at least in somemarkets.1 This view is held by many experts. For instance, Lipner (1990,
p.4) writes “[..] some manufacturers, while publicly opposed to gray market
sales of their products, privately do little to inhibit their ‡ow and in some instances even go so far as to encourage these transactions.”Similarly, a report
prepared for the EU Commission (NERA, 1999, p.11) states “[s]ome parallel
trade, however, seems to be bene…cial to the trademark owner. [..] If, forexample, there is for some reason over-production in the source country, andthe manufacturer would otherwise be left with an unsold stock, parallel trade
may be a means to raise pro…ts through additional sales. Another example isgoods such as clothing which are subject to fashion waves. Previous season’s
clothing in one country can still yield useful revenues in other countries”.
Furthermore, a “dealer might [..] have over ordered, or might have excess
quantities of an older or out-of-date version of the goods”(Lipner, 1990, p7).2
Consider the following speci…c examples. In the North American automobile market, retailers selling the products of a manufacturer must signa contract forbidding them to sell in other countries cars intended for salein one country. Yet over 200,000 new vehicles intended for the Canadianmarket were resold south of the border in 2001 (up from 16,000 in 1996; see
1

In the US, parallel imports were estimated to be worth $7-10 billions in the mid1980s (Cespedes, Corey and Rangan, 1988); today, estimates of $20 billion can be found(Computer Reseller News, 2001). In Europe, the volume of parallel imports varies from
5% of sales in markets like appliances, motorcars and consumer electronics to nearly 15%
for musical recordings, cosmetics and perfumes (NERA, 1999). In the UK, the numberof parallel imported motorcycles has increased from about 15,000 units in 1997 to 25,000
units in 1998 representing 25% of all new machines (House of Commons, 1999).
2
Similar points are made in Cespedes et al. (1988) about disk drives, in Computer
Reseller News (2001) about IT products, and in House of Commons (1999) about motorcycles, clothing/footwear and cosmetics. The case of earth-moving equipments during
the Asian crisis is interesting. The crisis redirected previously ordered equipment into thestrong US market causing the gray market share of hydraulic excavator sales to rise from
4.7% in 1997 to 19.5% in 1998 (Business Week, 1998).

2

Automotive News, 2002). Obviously, this no-parallel-trade clause is not enforced despite the fact that retailers face heavy penalties.3 Parallel importsarise in this market in part because of the quota system adopted by most
North American manufacturers. Retailers receive a pre-determined volume
allocation per model in order to force them to sell a minimum number ofcars without restricting retail prices.4 The consequence is often a mismatch
between demand and supply creating strong incentives for parallel trade between Canada and the US especially when a particular model sells well in
one country and not in the other.5 The automobile producers could easily
eliminate this unintended trade. The fact that they do not indicates thatthey are not particularly hurt by this trade. Other examples of parallel tradearise from the fact that particular models are not distributed in one country6 ,or that manufacturers deliberately oversupply certain markets because theywant to keep a presence there.7
The existing literature on parallel trade has mainly focused on the issue of
price discrimination (Malueg and Schwartz, 1999; Richardson, 2002; Maskus
and Chen, 2002). This literature generally …nds that manufacturers wantto avoid parallel trade, because the arbitrage implied by parallel trade interferes with their ability to segment markets and set di¤erent prices in di¤erent
countries.8 The welfare e¤ects of allowing parallel trade in these models are
3

Interestingly, this clause seems to have rarely been tested in court.
This huge increase in parallel imports is also due to wholesale pricing policies adopted
by the automobile producers in the two countries. Canadian dealers apparently bene…tfrom lower prices than their US counterparts, because they are located in a generallythiner, weaker and more price elastic market (Automotive News, 2002).
5“When a customer wants a car that the dealer cannot supply, the dealer has two
choices [...], they can turn the customer away or they can source the car from a Canadian
exporter [...]. When a new luxury car hits North American dealer lots, it can generate
year-long American waiting lists; [in Canada], they just sit on the lot” (Financial Post,
2001).
6
In Malysia, vehicles are imported by unauthorized dealers from Japan because Lexus
does not yet carry the full range of models in this country (Automotive News, 2004). See
World IT Report (2003) for similar examples concerning cellular phones.
7
For instance, Mercedes-Benz wanting to keep a presence in Barbados systematicallyships too many cars there. These cars typically are re-exported to the UK (see House ofCommons, 1999). According to this report, this implies that the manufacturer consents
to parallel trade.
8
Knox and Richardson (2002) show, however, that a foreign monopoly may bene…tfrom parallel trade when a country chooses both its tari¤ level and whether to allow
parallel trade. Ahmadi and Yang (2000), Cosac (2002) show that parallel imports may
43

generally ambiguous, simply because the elimination of price discrimination
may or may not be welfare improving (Tirole, 1988). We see our explanationof the role of parallel trade not as a substitute to this story but as a complement. In our model, the manufacturer’s incentive to allow parallel tradeis particularly strong when the price elasticity of demand is similar acrosscountries but there is uncertainty about the actual size of demand. This
incentive, however, quickly disappears in the presence of signi…cant (permanent or random) di¤erences in the price elasticity of demand across markets.
In this case, a manufacturer has every incentive to keep markets segmented
in order to practice (third degree) price discrimination. The manufacturer
hence typically faces a trade-o¤— at least for the products that satisfy ourconditions— between using international price discrimination and allowing
parallel trade to get retailers to order more inventory. This may explain why
the North American automobile manufacturers do not always enforce theno-parallel-trade clause.9
Finally, our approach shows that a key to understanding parallel trade is
to consider whether the incentives faced by manufacturers and retailers arealigned or not. When they are aligned, there is no need for manufacturers
to impose (or enforce) no-parallel-trade contracts with their retailers. In thissense, the present paper brings the economic literature on parallel trade closer
to the legal (including law and economics) literature where parallel trade (orgray markets) is mainly viewed as a contractual issue between manufacturers
and intermediaries (see Lipner, 1990; Gallini and Hollis, 1999).
The rest of the paper is organized as follows. In Section 2 we illustrate
the main points of the paper with the help of a simple example. Section 3
contains a general model and proofs of the main results. Section 4 concludes.
also bene…t manufacturers when they are preceived as di¤erent products with respect tothe authorized products.
9
Although retail prices for automobiles are lower in Canada than in the US (especially inthe luxury car segment), threatening retailers may be enough to limit parallel trade while
secretly tolerating it. It is only during periods of very signi…cant retail price di¤erences
between the US and Canada (whether due to a low Canadian dollar or to a demand
boom in the US as during the 1999-2001 period) that manufacturers start enforcing theno-parallel-trade clause.

4

2

An Example

Consider a risk-neutral monopoly manufacturer selling to a continuum ofrisk-neutral retailers in two di¤erent countries, denoted A and B. In turnthese competitive retailers sell to consumers. Retailers must deal with two
key characteristics of the market: …rst, they must order and take possessionof inventories before demand becomes known, and second, inventories left
unsold at the end of the demand period have no value. Retailers face a constant unit cost of distribution that we normalize to zero. The manufacturer’s
production cost is also assumed to be zero, as is the trade cost; this implies
that we do not need to specify in which country the manufacturer is located.
We denote the volume of realized sales in country i by qi . The volumeof realized sales may di¤er from the volume ordered from the manufacturer,
denoted by xi , if after the realization of demand some goods are reexported
or inventory is left unsold. Demand in country A is deterministic and givenby the simple inverse demand function pA = 1 qA . The inverse demand
function in B is pB = 1 qsB , where the random variable s takes the value of 1
if demand is high and < 1 if demand is low. The low state of demand occurs
with probability . We have picked these demand functions to illustrate twopoints. First, parallel imports in our model occur even if the manufacturer
does not price-discriminate between markets. In fact, a monopolist selling
directly to consumers would set the same price in the two markets. Second,
parallel imports may go in both directions, even if one country has a larger
market than the other and/or one country has deterministic demand.
The game we study has the following order of moves. The manufacturer…rst announces a wholesale price wi for each market i = A; B and whether
retailers have the authorization to engage in parallel trade. The retailers thenorder inventory and, after observing the true realization of demand, decide
where and how much to sell at the market-clearing price.

2.1

No Parallel Trade

We …rst derive the benchmark solution when the manufacturer does not
authorize the competitive retailers to ship any inventory to the other country(no parallel trade). In this case, the two markets are completely segmented
and equilibrium is the same as the solution to the ‡exible price game analyzed
by Deneckere et al. (1997). It is straightforward to show that, in market A,p^A = w^A = 1=2; q^A = x^A = 1=2 and the manufacturer’s pro…t is bm
A = 1=4.
5

Consider now market B. With competitive retailers, we can associatesales with the volume ordered from the manufacturer because retailers haveevery incentive to sell whatever volume they have ordered at whatever pricesupported by the market as the value of the product drops to zero at the endof the demand period. In particular, the retail price may e¤ectively drop tozero when the demand turns out to be low. Hence there are two possibilities
when the demand is low: the retail price may be positive or equal to zero.
Of course, this will depend on the level of the wholesale price: if it is highenough, inventories will tend to be low leading to a positive retail price. To
uncover the circumstance under which the retail price may fall to zero when
the demand is low, consider each case separately.
The representative retailer’s expected pro…t can be written as
xB
E rB = max 0; 1
xB + (1) (1 xB )xB wB xB :(1)
If the retail price in B falls to zero in the low demand state (maxf0; 1 xB g =0), the representative retailer earns positive revenue only when the demandis high. Since in equilibrium the retailer’s expected pro…t is necessarily equal
to zero, xB = 1 1wB . The manufacturer then chooses wB that maximizes
npi= wB xB . The solution is w
bB = 1 2 , implying an order volume ofB1xbB = 2 (= x^A ), a retail price in the state of high demand of pbhB = 12 , and a
low-demand retail price of pblB = 0. In the high-demand state retailers sell
their entire inventory, i.e., qbBh = 12 . Realized sales in the low-demand state
are equal to qbBl = min( ; 12 ). Hence, the manufacturer sets a low wholesale
price in order to induce retailers to order the level of inventory that would
be optimal if demand turned out to be high.
If the retail price in B is positive irrespective of the state of the demandB)(maxf0; 1 xB g = 1 xB ), xB = (1(1 w)+
ensures that the representative
retailer makes zero expected pro…t. The manufacturer then chooses w~B = 12
to maximize his expected pro…t. This implies that x~B = q~B = 2( (1 )+ ) <x^A , p~hB = 2(2((1(1 )+)+) ) ( p^A ) and p~lB = 2(2((1(1 )+)+) ) 1 ( p^A ). Hence the
manufacturer sets the same ‘high’wholesale price he would if demand werecertain to be high, but accepts that the inventory level is lower than incountry A and therefore too low when demand turns out to be high.
When the manufacturer does not authorize parallel trade, his optimal
strategy in B is straightforward. Comparing pro…ts, he chooses a high wholesale price, w
eB = 21 ; when he expects the demands in the two states to be relatively similar ( 121) and he chooses a low wholesale price, w
bB = 1 2 ;6otherwise ( < 12

2.2). As a result, the manufacturer’s total expected pro…t is
i
( h
1
1
+
if 12
1
npt
4
(1 )+
(2)
=
1
1
[2
]
if
<
4
2

Parallel Trade

We now consider the case where the manufacturer allows the retailers toengage in parallel trade. The direct e¤ect of allowing parallel trade is that itprovides retailers in B an opportunity to sell unsold inventories in A when
demand is low. Of course, the possibility of having to compete with parallel
imports from B means that retailers in A also face random (residual) demand
and may end up re-exporting part of their inventory to B when demand there
turns out to be higher than expected. Hence even with demand shocks inonly one country, parallel trade may take place in either direction.
Below, we denote the volume of parallel trade originating in B by mj ,where j = h; l denotes the state of demand in B. Since xi represents thevolume of orders, the volume of sales qi in the presence of parallel trade
is equal to xi + mj (i = A; B; j = h; l) in the country receiving parallel
imports and xi mj in the other country. It should be clear that when the
demand in B is low (j = l) then parallel trade necessarily goes from B to A
(ml > 0). However, when the demand in B is high (j = h), parallel trade
could potentially originate in B (mh > 0) or in A (mh < 0).
Given these assumptions, the expected retail pro…t in B when mh > 0 is
equal toE rB = f(1

xB

ml

+ (1

)f(1

xB

) xB

ml + (1mh ) xB

xA + ml )ml g

mh + (1(xA + mh ))mh g

wB xB ;
(3)and when mh < 0, the expected retail pro…t in B is
E rB =

f(1
+(1

xB
)(1

ml

) xB

xB

ml + (1mh )xBxA + ml )ml g

wB xB :

(4)

We make the further assumption that the di¤erence in demands that triggers parallel imports between the two countries is su¢ ciently small that the7

volume of parallel imports equalizes retail prices. Hence
1

xB

ml

=1

xA + mlor 1xB

mh = 1(xA + mh ):It follows that the volume of parallel trade is
ml =

xB
xA
xB xA
or mh =
:
1+
2

(5)

Substituting (5) into (3) or (4) and setting the representative retailer’s pro…tto zero (competition at the retail level), the relationship between wholesale
price and order volume such that the representative retailer expects zeropro…t is1 + + (1)(xA + xB ) ;(6)wB = 12 (1 + )irrespective of the direction of parallel trade.
Using the same reasoning as above, it is easy to verify that the relationshipin country A between wA and xA + xB is identical to (6). This means thatthe wholesale price in each country depends on the manufacturer’s overall
shipment only and that wA = wB . Of course, this is due to the assumptionthat parallel trade equalizes retail prices across countries. As a result, we canonly determine the total volume of orders that maximizes the manufacturer’s
overall pro…t, pt = wB (xA +xB ), where wB is given by (6). It is easy to showthat this overall pro…t is maximized for wB = 21 irrespective of the expecteddemand in B. This results in an overall shipment of X = (1+ +1+(1 )) and amanufacturer’s overall pro…t of
pt

=

1+
2 (1 + + (1

))

:

(7)

Hence, comparing (2) and (7), we obtain
Result 1: The manufacturer’s expected overall pro…t increases with parallel trade if demand in the low-demand state is not too low ( > 13 ) anddecreases otherwise.
Figure 1 illustrates the manufacturer’s total equilibrium pro…t as a function of with and without trade trade. Except at = 1, parallel trade raises
the manufacturer’s pro…t when the retail price in B remains positive evenwhen demand is low (corresponding to > 21 in Figure 1). It is also thecase when the retail price in B drops to zero in the low-demand state, at least8

if > 13 . The reason why parallel trade raises the manufacturer’s pro…tcan be seen most easily in the case where > 12 . Since wholesale prices
are the same with and without parallel trade, the increase in pro…t clearly
comes from the fact that retailers overall order more inventory when parallel
trade is authorized. The same e¤ect is at work if 13 < < 12 : parallel
trade gives retailers an incentive to order more inventory even without the
manufacturer having to reduce the wholesale price (as we saw he would do
without parallel trade). Finally, if < 31 — meaning that demand in B in
the low-demand state is extremely low— the e¤ect of parallel trade on theoverall level of inventory is exactly reversed. While still giving an incentive
to retailers in B to order more, this positive e¤ect is more than o¤set by thefact that parallel trade gives a strong disincentive to retailers in A who expect to be swamped with parallel imports when demand in B is low. Hence,
the manufacturer wants to prohibit parallel trade, precisely because he would
ship too little inventory overall.

2.3

WelfareWe now investigate the welfare e¤ects of allowing parallel trade, startingwith the e¤ect on consumer surplus. Suppose …rst that parallel trade is notallowed and let CSinpt denote the expected consumer surplus in country iin this case. In country A; consumer surplus is CSAnpt = 81 . The expected
domestic consumer surplus in B is
CSB = (1ql
plB ) B + (1
2

)(1

qh
phB ) B :2

(8)

The speci…c level of expected consumer surplus will depend on whether theretail price drops to zero when the state of the demand is low. If it does,using the respective prices and quantities in (8) yields CSBnpt = 4 +1
. If
8
npt
the retail price does not drop to zero, we obtain CSB = 8( (1 )+ ) .
Suppose now that parallel trade is allowed, and let CSipt denote expectedconsumer surplus in country i. Above, we only found that xA + xB = X =1+. Hence, we do not know the volume of orders from each country(1+ + (1 ))and the volume of parallel trade. To compute consumer surplus for eachcountry, all we need, however, is individual country sales which can be foundin the following way. Suppose demand in B is low. Since parallel tradeequalizes retail prices, it must be true that 1 qB = 1 qA and thus qA = qB .
9

In addition, parallel trade makes sure that, across the two countries, total
sales must be equal to total orders (i.e., qA + qB = xA + xB ). Combining
these two conditions, we get
qBl = (xA + xB )and qBh =1+

xA + xB2

when demand in B is low, respectively high. Once we have computed retailprices in B, we can use (8) to obtain
CSApt =

4 + (1)(1 + )2
4 + (1)(1 + )2
pt
and
CS
=
:
B
8(1 + + (1))28(1 + + (1))2

A comparison of expected consumer surplus in the two countries with andwithout parallel imports yields the following result.
Result 2: Parallel trade raises expected consumer surplus in country A. It
raises expected consumer surplus in country B provided that the retail price1
is positive without parallel trade (), and reduces it otherwise.
2
When the demand is very low in the low-demand state, the retail price inB drops to zero, and this can only bene…t consumers. Allowing parallel trade
makes this possibility less likely and this e¤ect is detrimental to consumers.
However, parallel trade also induces retailers to place larger orders, which isgood for consumers. It is this e¤ect that explains why consumer surplus in
B is higher with parallel trade when is high enough to guarantee positive
retail prices in all states of demand. Since the retail price never drops to zeroin A, this e¤ect also explains why consumer surplus in A always increases
with parallel trade. Clearly, allowing parallel trade is pro…table for the manufacturer exactly for the same reason that consumers in both countries likeit, namely because retailers order more inventory— at least for su¢ ciently
high values of .
Finally we turn to world social welfare, which consists of the sum of
consumer surplus and the manufacturer’s pro…t (the retailers expect zeropro…t) and thus to W = CSA + CSB + . Figure 2 illustrates W with andwithout parallel trade. We …nd:
Result 3: Parallel trade raises expected world welfare if is su¢ ciently high1
) and reduces it otherwise.
(2
The key insight is that the interests of consumers and the manufacturer
will often be aligned when it comes to the kind of parallel trade examined1
here: when demand shocks are not too large (), parallel trade raises
210both the manufacturer’s pro…t and consumer surplus in both countries. This
simple result is in sharp contrast with the conclusions of the previous literature that views parallel trade as a price discrimination issue. Parallel tradein that literature typically produces a disagreement between consumers andproducers on the one hand, and between consumers in di¤erent countries on
the other (see Malueg and Schwartz, 1994).

3

Generalization

Consider now a more general speci…cation of the demand and the distributionof the demand shock. Let demand in country A be given by the function
DA (p) and demand in B by DB (p; ), with Dpi < 0, where i = A; B and 2[ ; + ] is the (non-negative) realization of a random variable with densityf ( ) and cumulative distribution F ( ). We still assume that in the presenceof parallel trade prices are strictly positive for all realizations of demand.
Note, however, that we no longer restrict the market in B to be smaller thanthe one in A.
Writing the inverse demand functions as pA = pA (qA ) and pB = pB (qB ; )and letting m > 0 denote the volume of parallel trade going from B to A,r, as
we can express the expected retail revenue in A, ERA
R +pA (xA + m)xA f ( )dR +fpA (xA + m) (xA + m) + pB (xBm; ) ( m)g f ( )dif m 0(9)
if m < 0;r, asand that in B, ERB

R +fpB (xB m; )(xB m) + pA (xA + m)mg f ( )dR +pB (xB m; )xB f ( )dif m 0
if m < 0:(10)

Since the expected retail pro…ts, E ri = ERir wi xi ; i = A; B, must equal
zero, we can write the manufacturer’s problem of maximizing the expectedvalue of = wA xA + wB xB as
Z +max
fpA (xA + m) (xA + m) + pB (xB m; ) (xB m)g f ( )d : (11)xA ;xBThe volume of parallel trade, m = m(xA ; xB ; ), is the ‡ow of goods that
equalizes retail prices across the two countries ex post for each level of xA ,11

xB and . It is implicitly de…ned bypA (xA + m) = pB (xB

m; ):

(12)

Suppose that the manufacturer’s pro…t is maximized for m = 0, and let
the corresponding pro…t-maximizing order volumes be denoted by xA and xB ;also assume, for the time being, that retail prices are non-negative at thesevolumes for all realizations of . Then the derivative of (11) with respect tom must be zero at m = 0,
Z+

fpA (xA ) + xA p0A (xA )pB (xB ; )xB p0B (xB ; )g f ( )d = 0:(13)

That is, the manufacturer will set wholesale prices ex ante so that the volumes
ordered by the retailers, xA and xB , equalize expected marginal revenues in
A and B. In addition, expected marginal revenues must equal marginal cost,which is zero,pA (xA ) + xA p0A (xA ) =Z+

fpB (xB ; ) + xB p0B (xB ; )g f ( )d = 0:

(14)

Ex post, however, when the demand shock has been realized, marginal
revenues may no longer be equalized for xA and xB . That is, we may have
M RA

(pA (xA ) + xA p0A (xA )) = 0 ? pB (xB ; ) + xB p0B (xB ; )M RB ( ):(15)
In this case, an ex-post reallocation of output between markets would raise
the manufacturer’s expected pro…t. This can best be seen if we suppose thatthe manufacturer could do the reallocation himself, that is if distribution
and production were vertically integrated. For realizations of for which
M RB ( ) > 0, the manufacturer would ship goods from A to B until marginal
revenues are equalized, thereby raising his ex-post pro…t. When the realized
value of is such that M RB ( ) < 0, the manufacturer would not reallocate
goods but sell only enough units to make marginal revenue in B equal tozero, leaving some inventory unsold in the process. The ability to reallocate
goods ex post would thus increase the manufacturer’s pro…t for high values ofand leave pro…t unchanged for low values. It follows that from an ex-ante
perspective the manufacturer’s expected pro…t would be higher if he had theoption of reallocating goods ex post.
12

Of course, in the scenario we consider the goods have been sold to independent retailers. Hence the question is whether simply allowing them toengage in parallel trade can bring about an ex-post reallocation of goods thatwould raise the manufacturer’s expected pro…t. The retailers will carry out
parallel trade whenever there are di¤erences in retail prices across countries.
Retailers that can sell their goods in another country where prices are higher
gain, those that see retail prices fall due to parallel imports lose. Will theaggregate retail pro…t in the two countries rise for a given realization ofwhen parallel trade eliminates retail price di¤erences? The answer is yes, if
for the given the equalization of retail prices also moves marginal revenues
closer to each other. Otherwise, aggregate retail pro…t for this value offalls.
To learn whether ex ante expected aggregate retail pro…t rises or falls
when parallel trade is allowed, one has to weight ex-post retail pro…ts withthe density and integrate over . If the expected aggregate retail pro…t in A
and B rises, then this implies that for given wholesale prices retailers haveto order more inventory in order to keep the zero-pro…t constraint impliedby perfect competition satis…ed. This in turn means that the manufacturer’s
expected pro…t, expected consumer surplus (in the two countries taken together) and therefore also expected world welfare increase. By contrast, if
the expected aggregate retail pro…t falls when parallel trade is allowed, thenthe manufacturer’s expected pro…t, aggregate consumer surplus and world
welfare decrease.
Therefore the crucial question is whether there exist su¢ cient conditions
under which parallel trade raises expected aggregate retail pro…ts and underwhich it lowers them. We prove the following result:
Proposition 1 (a) If DA (p) = D(p) and DB (p; ) = D(p), and F ( ) putssu¢ ciently little probability mass on realizations of for which retail pricefalls to zero without parallel trade, then allowing parallel trade raises the
manufacturer’s expected pro…t, expected world consumer surplus and expectedworld welfare. (b) If the inverse demand functions take the form pA = p(q)and pB = p(q), then permitting parallel trade reduces the manufacturer’s
expected pro…t, expected world consumer surplus and expected world welfare.
Proof: (a) In this case, it is straightforward to show that the price elasticity
of demand, "(p), does not depend on . Hence marginal revenues in A and13

B are equalized ex post if
1"(pA )pA 1= pB 11"(pB )(16);

i.e. whenever pA = pB . Hence parallel trade, by equalizing retail prices forevery value of , must raise expected aggregate retail pro…ts. This is true
under the implicit assumption that in the absence of parallel trade retailprices are non-negative for all realizations of demand.
Suppose now that without parallel trade the choice of xA and xB causes
the retail price in B to drop to zero for low realizations of demand. Inxparticular, let ~ ~(xB ) be de…ned by pB ( ~B ) = 0, so that price is zero for
2 [ ; ~].10 We then have to modify (14) as follows:pA (xA ) + xA p0A (xA ) =

Z

+

~

x
x
x
pB ( B ) + B p0B ( B ) f ( )d = 0:

(17)

For any 2 [ ; ~], goods will ‡ow from B to A if we allow parallel trade.
This will have no e¤ect at …rst on retailer pro…ts in B because the pricethere is zero. The retailer pro…ts in A, however, must fall as successive units
are shipped there, since xA was chosen optimally and additional units cause
marginal revenue to become negative. Thus parallel trade may lower ex-post
aggregate retail pro…t for low values of . For 2 (~; + ] parallel trade
will raise overall ex-post retail pro…t for the reasons given in the preceding
paragraph. Hence the overall e¤ect of parallel trade will depend on the
distribution of . In particular, if there is su¢ ciently little probability mass
on [ ; ~], the expected aggregate retail pro…t will increase with parallel trade.
(b) In this case one can easily show that an equalization of marginal
revenues requires equal shipments to each market independent of ,p(xA ) 1

1"(xA )= p(xB ) 1

1"(xB );(18)and hence almost always results in di¤erent retail prices. Allowing retailers
to engage in parallel trade necessarily pushes marginal revenues apart in thetwo countries for every value of and hence reduces expected aggregate retailpro…t.
10

Note that we let pB = pB ( qB ) be the inverse of DB (p; ) = D(p).

14The proposition shows that the form of demand uncertainty plays a crucial role in determining whether parallel trade is desirable or not. One way tointerpret the demand shock in (a) is to assume that consumers in both countries have identical individual demand functions, but that the manufacturer
does not know how many consumers there will be for his product. Hence,at any given price, the price elasticity of demand is the same across the twocountries, but the manufacturer does not know how much he will sell at thatprice. Both manufacturers and retailers have the same incentives with respect to parallel trade: let retailers ship goods ex post to the market where
demand is highest so that it pays them to order more inventory. Case (b)can be viewed as a situation in which consumers in the two countries di¤er intheir willingness to pay, but the manufacturer is uncertain about how muchthey di¤er. This situation requires that the retail price of the good adjust ex
post to the realized willingness to pay. Without parallel trade, perfect competition between retailers ensures that this adjustment takes place. Parallel
trade, however, interferes with this price adjustment because a rise in the retail price tends to draw parallel imports into the country. In anticipation ofthis, retailers will order less inventory, thereby reducing the manufacturer’s
pro…t, as well as consumer surplus and welfare.

4

Conclusions

This paper demonstrates that there are circumstances under which it pays
a manufacturer to allow retailers to engage in parallel trade. Speci…cally,parallel trade gives retailers an incentive to place larger orders than they
otherwise would. Moreover, parallel trade in these circumstances is generally
welfare improving. These results arise when three conditions are met: …rst,
retailers must place orders before they know the state of the demand; second,
the states of the demand are di¤erent across markets; and third the products
have little value at the end of the demand period (or equivalently, it is costly
to maintain them as inventories).
The type of demand shock also matters. In particular, we should expect
to see parallel imports encouraged by manufacturers in those industries inwhich consumers’willingness to pay is relatively similar across markets but
for which there is uncertainty about how many consumers will actually choose
to buy. In short, these would be products that are relatively standard but for
one reason or another the manufacturers have a di¢ cult time anticipating the15

volume of sales. The toy market seems like a good example of such market,
but so are certain segments of the fashion, motorcycle or even automobile
market, as well as the electronics market.
It is important to note that there are other possible mechanisms thatwould allow a manufacturer to reduce destructive competition. Three cometo mind: vertical integration with retailers, resale price maintenance (see Deneckere et al., 1997), or a return policy for unsold inventories. The point of
the paper is that parallel trade constitutes a particularly simple mechanism
to achieve this goal. We would expect this to be true, especially if the manufacturer has less information than retailers about local market conditions, as
seems especially likely if the manufacturer is located overseas. Resale pricemaintenance, for instance, would involve considerably more checking andmonitoring of retailers than allowing parallel imports. Similarly a manufacturer’s return policy is costly, not only because it might allow well informed
local retailers to shirk on sales e¤ort, but also because a foreign manufacturer
may have no particular physical facilities in its export markets to handle returned merchandise. Finally, vertical integration may be di¢ cult for a foreign
manufacturer again due to informational asymmetries, but also because themarket volume may be too small to justify the investment.

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16

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18

Π

1
2

Π pt
2− λ
4

Π npt

1
2(1 + λ )

0

1−λ
3 −λ

1− λ
2− λ

Figure 1: Manufacturer's total profit

1

θ

W

3/4

W pt
12 − 8λ − λ2
8( 2 − λ )

W npt

3
(2 − λ)8
34(1 + λ )

0

1− λ
2 −λ

Figure 2: World Social Welfare1θ