Der Markt für Sekundärregelenergie – Eine Bewertung des Regelenergieeinsatzes im Rahmen des Netzregelverbundes

In Germany there are four control areas that are operated by four independent system operators. Up to November 2008 there occurred antipodal use of secondary balancing power. Because this is inefficient, the market for secondary balancing power had been harmonized step by step. Since May 1st, 2010, harmonization is complete and no antipodal use occurs, so secondary balancing power should be used in an efficient way. This paper starts with an analysis of the auction data from May 1st, 2010 to December 31st, 2010. Total costs are computed as well. In the next step, total costs are computed. Subsequently, a comparison with the data before the harmonization process is made. On the one hand, major efficiency gains have been achieved. On the other hand, bids have strongly increased, which may be due to a different market environment, but also due to strategic bid submission.     

Last-Minute Bidding in Sequential Auctions with Unobserved, Stochastic Entry

Using a dataset of calculator auctions on eBay, we first show that last-minute bidding is not merely the result of bidders’ going to the next-to-close auction. Instead, bidding is concentrated at the end of the period in which the auction is the next to close, suggesting the existence of strategic last-minute bidding. Then, we model repeated, ascending price auctions for homogeneous goods with unobserved, stochastic entry. We show that the dynamic game has a pure-strategy symmetric equilibrium in which entrants always reveal themselves by bidding in the auction in which they arrive, and bidding occurs at the last minute.     

Polish experience from first-ever spectrum auction

The Polish 4G spectrum auction was a watershed event for the Polish telecommunications market. For the first time in history, the Office of Electronic Communications decided to award spectrum by using an auction process. Polish regulators implemented a simultaneous multiple-round ascending-bid auction, which was widely used worldwide for selling spectrum. The process leading to the auction and the auction itself was lengthy and eventful. Due to the wrong auction design, the auction dragged on indefinitely, causing a delay in spectrum distribution. The auction ended only as a result of the government's intervention, after 8 months (513 rounds) of bidding that raised revenue of over PLN 9 billion (over EUR 2 billion). This paper describes in detail the rules of the Polish 4G auction, analyses bidding behaviour and auction dynamics of the crucial phases of auctions, and presents the final outcomes. It also draws lessons that could help policy makers in Poland and other countries in auction design.     

Auctioneers sometimes prefer entry fees to extra bidders

We investigate a market thickness–market power tradeoff in an auction setting with endogenous entry. We find that charging admission fees can sometimes dominate the benefit of recruiting additional bidders, even though the fees themselves implicitly reduce competition at the auction stage. We also highlight that admission fees and reserve prices are different instruments in a setting with uncertainty over entry costs, and that optimal mechanisms in such settings may be more complex than simply setting a reserve price. Our results provide a counterpoint to the broad intuition of Bulow and Klemperer (1996) that market thickness often takes precedence over market power in auction design.     

How Do Land Auction Formats Influence the Market Structure and Aggregate Surplus of Real Estate Development?

This article proposes a duopoly dynamic game theoretic model to investigate the market structure and aggregate surplus of real estate development when land is sold in a sealed‐bid first price auction vis‐à‐vis an open English auction. It relaxes the assumption of symmetric bidders. The land values have common value and private value components. We find that the sealed‐bid first price auction introduces competition in the real estate development market. The open English auction leads a monopoly market. State agencies are recommended to increase the aggregate surplus of real estate development by publishing past bidding information under the sealed‐bid first price auction and reducing information asymmetry between bidders.     

Spectrum Auction Design

Spectrum auctions are used by governments to assign and price licenses for wireless communications. The standard approach is the simultaneous ascending auction, in which many related lots are auctioned simultaneously in a sequence of rounds. I analyze the strengths and weaknesses of the approach with examples from US spectrum auctions. I then present a variation-the combinatorial clock auction-which has been adopted by the UK and many other countries, which addresses many of the problems of the simultaneous ascending auction while building on its strengths. The combinatorial clock auction is a simple dynamic auction in which bidders bid on packages of lots. Most importantly, the auction allows alternative technologies that require the spectrum to be organized in different ways to compete in a technology-neutral auction. In addition, the pricing rule and information policy are carefully tailored to mitigate gaming behavior. An activity rule based on revealed preference promotes price and assignment discovery throughout the clock stage of the auction. Truthful bidding is encouraged, which simplifies bidding and improves efficiency. Experimental tests and early auctions confirm the advantages of the approach.     

Spectrum Licensing,Policy Instruments and Market Entry

Competition policy attempts to address the potential for market failure by encouraging competition in service markets. Often, in wireless communication service markets, national regulatory authorities seek to encourage entry via the spectrum assignment process. Instruments used include the assignment mode (auction or beauty contest), setting aside licenses and providing bidding (price and quantity) credits for potential entrants, and making more licenses (spectrum blocks) available than there are incumbent firms (excess licenses). The empirical analysis assesses the effectiveness of these policy instruments on encouraging entry. The econometric results show that the probability of entry is enhanced by using auction assignments and excess licenses. Furthermore, quantity, but not price, concessions encourage entry.     

Cartel stability in experimental first-price sealed-bid and English auctions

Using laboratory experiments, we compare the stability of bidding rings in the first-price sealed-bid auction and the English auction in a heterogeneous-value setting. In both a re-matching condition and a fixed-matching condition, we observe that bidding rings are more stable in the English auction than in the first-price sealed-bid auction. In both conditions, the first-price sealed-bid auction dominates the English auction in terms of average revenue and the revenue spread. The English auction outperforms the first-price sealed-bid auction in terms of efficiency.     

Auctions with bid credits and resale

Bid credits favoring subsets of bidders are routinely imposed on auctions and procurement auctions. These bid credits result in inefficient auction outcomes, which create pressure for post-auction resale or, in a procurement context, for subcontracting. We show that the presence of resale, in turn, affects bidding strategies in such a way that auction outcomes are more likely to be inefficient and less informative, making it harder for resale to correct inefficiencies. The negative effects of bid credits and resale can be mitigated through direct restrictions on resale, tight caps on credits, reserve prices, anonymous bidding, and enhanced competition.     

Price Sensitivity of Hourly Day-ahead and Quarter-hourly Intraday Auctions in Germany

The introduction of the quarter-hourly intraday auction in 2014 for the German market confirms a tendency towards short-term energy markets. The reason for the new market was the need to trade shorter periods than just hours a day-ahead to minimize open positions in the more volatile continuous intraday trading. The increased production capacity of solar power boosted this requirement for new short-term power products. The quarter-hourly market shows a distinctive zigzag price formation. We identify two influencing factors: first, the solar residual that combines the trading of solar power ramps around midday as well as the gradients of consumption and thermal power plant ramps throughout the course of the day, and second, a characteristic two stage market design with higher liquidity for the hourly than for the quarter-hourly auction. Therefore, demand, solar generation and inflexible ramps of thermal power plants are hedged at the hourly day-ahead auction and use the quarter-hourly auction only to balance the remaining differences. To prove this argument the price sensitivities of the hourly day-ahead and quarter-hourly intraday auctions in Germany are compared based on actual bid and ask curves from 2015 and 2016. Finally, the development of an adequate design of future spot markets is discussed.     

我国城镇建设有关土地制度创新研究

目前我国土地管理中存在着土地市场不完善．国土基金管理不到位等问题。应完善我国土地市场和加强国土基金使用管理。应加快土地资源的市场配置．完善国有土地有偿使用制度．推进国有土地使用权的招标、拍卖和挂牌出让。建立土地收购储备制度．以促进土地的可持续利用。完善城镇土地的出租制．采取长租、短租或临时出租等方式，以保证土地的长期收益。建立集体土地流转制度。成立国土基金专户．国土基金专款专用．收支两条线．实行国土基金的计划管理制度和监管制度。     

Design von Informationsfeedback in Regelenergiemärkten

Information feedback is a much debated issue on balancing power markets: which information on past auctions should be published and when? The article analyzes advantages and disadvantages of different feedback policies applied to the example of the Swiss balancing power market. Our main conclusion is that the publication of the marginal bid is usually recommendable. This is often not the case for additional information (e.g. extramarginal bids). However, the answer depends on the specific market design and the market structure.     

Empfehlungen für das Auktionsdesign für Emissionsberechtigungen

From an economic perspective, auctions are an appropriate mechanism for the initial allocation of emissions allowances, because they tend to be advantageous with respect to distributional and efficiency goals. Different auction designs can lead to different outcomes, though, and so the choice of the auction rules is a critical challenge. Recent developments in auction theory and rich experiences with practical auction design in the energy and many other sectors can help avoiding mistakes and designing an appropriate auction mechanism. This study summarizes the relevant research and concludes with concrete recommendations for the auction design for CO₂ allowances. In particular, it analyzes how the strategic options of buyers and sellers depend on the auction rules, and explains how secondary markets for allowances interact with bidding strategies and optimal institutional design.     

Efficiency in Second-Price Auctions: A New Look at Old Data

Experiments on second-price sealed-bid private value auctions have established that subjects typically bid more than their value, despite the fact that value bidding is a dominant strategy in such auctions. Moreover, the laboratory evidence shows that subjects do not learn to bid their values as they gain more experience. In the present paper, we re-examine the second-price auction data from Kagel and Levin’s (Econ J 103:868–879, 1993) classic paper. We find that auction efficiency increases over time, even though the frequency of overbidding is unchanged. We argue that the rise in efficiency is due to a decline in the variability of overbidding. This is consistent with subjects’ learning to bid more like each other.     

Sourcing from the Enemy: Horizontal Subcontracting in Highway Procurement

I empirically consider the effect of horizontal subcontracting on firm bidding strategies in California highway construction auctions. Subcontractors are hired by prime contractors prior to the auction, and the subcontractor may also be a competitor in the primary auction. While horizontal subcontracting may improve productive efficiency, it softens the horizontal subcontractor's bid strategy, since winning the auction may entail losing subcontracting business. I find that while each additional competitor supplied by the firm is estimated to increase its bid by 1.4 per cent, the winning bid is uncorrelated with horizontal subcontracting. This points toward an efficiency motive for cross‐supply.     

Selling spectrum in the presence of shared networks: The case of the Israeli 5G auction

The Israeli 5G auction that took place in August 2020 used the Combinatorial Clock Auction mechanism adapted to the Israeli market. We review the challenges that the Israeli Ministry of Communication faced while designing the auction and discuss the strategic consequences of the design. We highlight the special characteristics of the Israeli telecommunication market and, in particular, the fact that most operators share their antenna networks and their spectrum assets with other auction participants, but spectrum licenses need to be purchased by each operator individually. The Israeli Ministry of Communication required operators sharing the same networks to submit joint bids in the auction. We discuss the implications of this decision on the efficiency of the auction, and the difficulties it caused the bidders. We discuss the effect of further incentive schemes that accompanied the auction, and we also describe some signaling opportunities that emerged during the auction process.     

On-line spectrum auctions in TV white spaces for supporting mobile services—A practical manual

This paper considers an approach for dynamic short-term spectrum leasing in TV white spaces (TVWS) using an on-line auction. The secondary spectrum market discussed here is organized by a central entity called the spectrum broker. The auctioned spectrum appears in blocks of available DVB-T channels with some transmit power constraints set-up to protect the primary users (DVB-T receivers). The bidders are institutional spectrum operators (telecommunication companies or service providers), operating in a given area. These players are characterized by heterogeneous demands concerning the spectrum bandwidth, the operation period with temporarily-exclusive rights for using the spectrum and the transmit power needed for successful transmission. Thus, the auctioned objects are non-identical and present different value for different players. Two auction models are proposed. The first one is the simultaneous auction in time domain and combinatorial in frequency and power dimension. The second proposed auction is fully combinatorial. Simulations results are also provided showing effectiveness of the analyzed auctions (high spectrum utilization ratio) and relation between the players’ satisfaction, their spectrum valuation and varying competition. Finally the guidelines concerning the spectrum auctions in TVWS for the policy makers are proposed.     

Bidding asymmetries in multi-unit auctions: Implications of bid function equilibria in the British spot market for electricity

This paper introduces and tests Bid Function Equilibria (BFE) in the British spot market for electricity. BFE extend von der Fehr and Harbord's (1993) multi-unit auction model of wholesale electricity markets by allowing firms to have heterogeneous costs for different generating units. Pure-strategy equilibria in BFE predict asymmetric bidding by producers: a single firm (the “price-setter") bids strategically while other firms (“non-price-setters") bid their costs. We test for asymmetries in firms' bid functions in the British spot market between 1993 and 1995 and find strong empirical support for the theory. We conclude that BFE have important implications for the design and governance of electricity markets.     

Rational bidding in a procurement auction with subjective evaluations

In practice, procurement auctions often involve subjective evaluations of bids, especially when consisting of quality or design parameters which are hard to quantify. We formally define a notion of subjectivity in an auction environment and analyze the implications for rational bidding behavior. Our findings explain some observed bidding behaviors that are inconsistent with standard equilibrium predictions. Finally we examine the way subjectivity facilitates the practice of favoritism on part of the auctioneer.     

Auctions with quantity externalities and endogenous supply

This paper studies the design of license auctions when the number of licenses allocated in the auction determines structure of the post-auction market. I first show that a sequence of conditional reserve prices that specify minimum acceptable bid at each supply level can be used to determine supply endogenously. Then I construct a static auction called multi-dimensional uniform-price auction and a dynamic auction called Walrasian clock auction that allow the auctioneer to condition reserve price on supply and allow bidders to condition bids on supply. I show that both proposed auctions can implement the efficient market structure that maximizes total surplus in the post-auction market in a dominant strategy equilibrium. I next characterize the optimal auction and show that the two proposed auctions can yield the optimal revenue under a sequence of optimal reserve prices.