Guido Bongioanni | European University Institute

About Me

I am a fifth-year PhD Economics student at the European University Institute. My advisors are Russell Cooper and Giancarlo Corsetti.

My research interests are in macroeconomics, with a focus on market power and the behavior of firms and workers.

In April 2025 I co-founded Alleanza per Torino, with other fellow Turin citizens. Alleanza per Torino is a think tank focused on stimulating debate and advancing proposals for Turin’s growth.

Before joining the EUI I worked as a pre-doctoral Research Assistant at IESE Business School for Carles Vergara and Núria Mas.

Working Papers

Crushing the Competition: the Pro-Competitive Effects of Relative Performance Evaluation

Guido Bongioanni, Bruno Pellegrino, Shihan Shen

Working Paper

PDF Presentations: SIOE 2023, UChicago Stigler Center Affiliate Conference, EUI, Rice Brownbag, Oligo Workshop 2025, CICM 2025, SED 2025, SEA 2025, Network Science and Economics Conference 2026
Relative Performance Evaluation (RPE) is a feature of executive compensation that evaluates a manager’s performance relative to peer firms. Economic theory predicts that, under sufficient risk sharing between managers and shareholders, firms that adopt RPE should engage in more aggressive product-market conduct (i.e. charge lower prices). However, the extent of RPE adoption and its market effects remain disputed: firm disclosures often reference RPE, yet managers’ pay shows little correlation with competitors’ performance despite its well-documented sensitivity to market-wide shocks. We study the adoption and product-market effects of RPE using a network oligopoly model (Pellegrino, 2025) with ultra-realistic managerial incentives, disciplined by granular data from over 350,000 executive compensation contracts. We find that RPE is widespread in form but limited in substance: pay remains tied mainly to absolute objectives, and relative performance is typically benchmarked against broad stock-market indices rather than close rivals. These adoption patterns substantially dampen RPE’s competitive impact, reconciling the seemingly contradictory evidence. Counterfactual simulations indicate that stronger, rival-based RPE could enhance competition and consumer welfare, but such effects remain modest under current practices.

Work in Progress

Game, Set and Match: Playing, Learning, and Retiring in Professional Tennis (with Christopher J. Flinn and Pietro Garibaldi)

This paper investigates the timing of retirement in high-intensity occupations where performance signals are noisy, and agents must learn about their latent ability. Using a rich monthly panel of over 10,000 professional tennis players from 2000 to 2021, we characterize the relationship between performance trajectories and career exits. We document three robust stylized facts: (1) careers are generally short—with a median duration of three years—and highly right-skewed; (2) players typically retire following a decline from their peak performance rather than at the peak; and (3) career length is positively correlated with peak ability. Survival analysis reveals substantial heterogeneity, where lower-ranked players exit rapidly while elite players sustain careers into their thirties. These patterns suggest that retirement decisions are driven significantly by an information-updating process regarding competitive fit, distinct from pure age-related physical decline.

Policy and Media

April 2026: White Book with Alleanza per Torino on Turin as a University City
February 2018: Tackling Italy’s productivity slowdown (Il Sole 24 Ore)

Contacts

I am happy to connect and talk about research, collaborations, or grad school.

Address: European University Institute, Department of Economics
Via delle Fontanelle 18, 50014 Fiesole

Email: guido.bongioanni@eui.eu
Github: github.com/bonogg
Twitter: twitter.com/bonogg