Bidders' and Sellers' Strategies in Sequential Auctions. New Evidence about the Afternoon Effect

Using dynamic panel data econometric techniques, we analyzethe price structure of sequential auctions of modern and contemporary art that took place inItaly during the period 1983–1996. Contrary to previous empirical studies, we do not find anyafternoon effect, or decline of auction prices relative to estimated values. Taking intoconsideration the structure of the auctions and the dynamic nature of price determination, we proposean interpretation of the empirical results that encompasses previous contributions.     

Retaliatory Equilibria in a Japanese Ascending Auction for Multiple Objects

We construct a family of retaliatory equilibria for the Japanese ascending auction for multiple objects and show that, while it is immune to many of the tacitly collusive equilibria studied in the literature, it is not entirely immune when some bidders are commonly known to be interested in a specific object.     

Optimal auctions with multidimensional types and the desirability of exclusion

Within the context of a single-unit, independent private values auction model, we show that if bidder types are multidimensional, then under the optimal auction exclusion of a positive measure of bidder types occur. The results complements Armstrong’s (1996) exclusion of types result.     

The Package Assignment Model

We study assignment problems where individuals trade packages consisting of several, rather than single, objects. Although buyers' reservations values are non-additive, efficient assignments can be formulated as a linear programming problem in which the pricing functions expressing duality may be non-linear in the objects constituting the packages. The interconnections among the linear programming formulation, Walrasian equilibrium, and the core are established. In the single seller (auction) version, a necessary and sufficient condition is given for the Vickrey payoff point to be implementable by a pricing equilibrium. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: C62, D44, D51.     

Sequential Markets: An Experimental Investigation of Clower's Dual-Decision Hypothesis

Countless experimental studies have shown that markets converge quickly and efficiently to the competitive outcome under many trading institutions, particularly the double auction mechanism. This creates difficulties for Keynesian stories of unemployment creation—which suggest a noncompetitive outcome in an essentially competitive world. Such stories were popular in the late 1960s and 1970s. One of these stories—the dual decision hypothesis of Clower—was seen then as the beginning of a story of unemployment. This article reports the results of an experiment designed to test this hypothesis. Specifically, we set up an experiment in which there are two sequential double-auction markets, in the first of which one good (labour) is traded, after which the second market (goods) is opened and the second good traded. We compare the outcome of our experiment with that of the competitive theory. One general finding is that not enough trade takes place in the two markets. In other words, the usual finding that competitive equilibrium is achieved in double-auction markets is not replicated in this sequential setting. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

From Fatwallet to eBay: An investigation of online deal-forums and sales promotions

Sales promotions are an important part of retail advertising strategy. Traditionally, research on sales promotions has generally assumed that the buyers are end consumers who do not engage in reselling, in large part due to high transaction costs. However, the recent Internet related technologies have dramatically lowered the cost of transferring goods between consumers, leading to relative ease of reselling activity amongst individual consumers. Little is known about the impact of this phenomenon on retailer's sales promotion strategy. In this research we investigate the reselling activity in online auctions for products that active deal seekers can obtain at deeply discounted prices from retailers. We further investigate the role of deal-forums in the resale process. Data is collected from an online deal-forum (http://www.fatwallet.com/) and eBay to test various reselling-related hypotheses. The results show that there is a significant abnormal increase in the number of newly posted auctions of a product after the deal information of this product is posted on deal-forum website. We also find that there is a significant price incentive for individuals to resell. The implications for sales promotion research and practice are discussed.