Possibilities for quantitative measurement of transaction costs at the microlevel

At the contemporary stage of the global economic development our attention isdrawn to the fact that the competitive battle is being shifted from the sphere of actualproduction to the area of its preparation, service and the placement of the finished products,that is, towards the sphere of transaction costs. Their existence and increasing rolewas noticed long ago, but it still remains a theoretical construct, due tothe lack of satisfactory,generally accepted methods for their quantitative measurement. The present studyis an attempt in that direction, in order for the theory of transaction costs to come closer tothe practice and the daily round of the experts and the entrepreneurs. In that connectionthere is clarified the modern interpretation of transaction costs, their scope and the possibilityto identify the latter in the existing financial and accounting documentation. Thereare analyzed enterprises from the financial sphere and from steelmaking, by way of illustration of two poles in business strategies with respect to the scale and the use of transaction costs.