What is Lost by Waiting to Invest
研究不确定性和不完全竞争下的投资时机，发现战略竞争下早期投资能获取更大市场优势，不确定性高时反而鼓励立即投资，挑战了传统实物期权理论。
We study investment timing under uncertainty and imperfect competition. The real options literature studies investment timing when (a) the firm has a monopoly over an investment opportunity, and (b) the product market is perfectly competitive. As a result, firms tend to postpone investment as uncertainty increases. We show instead that in a market with strategic competition, early investment endogenously confers a greater capability to take advantage of future growth opportunities. This strategic advantage leads to the capture of a greater share of the market, either by dissuading entry or by inducing competitors to 'make room' for the stronger competitor. As a result of this growth option effect, payoffs are usually more convex than under the waiting-to-invest option. When this strategic effect is strong, increased uncertainty encourages immediate investment. The result is confirmed when we allow for simultaneous entry, and is robust to different forms of strategic interaction. Our results may be surprising in the light of current practice, which tends to view volatility as a strong disincentive for new investment. However, under strong strategic competition, higher uncertainty clearly presents greater opportunities than risks.