IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/umc/wpaper/0504.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Rational Participation Revolutionizes Auction Theory

Author

Abstract

Potential bidders respond to a seller's choice of auction mechanism for a common-value or affiliated-values asset by endogenous decisions whether to incur a participation cost (and observe a private signal), or forego competing. Privately informed participants decide whether to incur a bid-preparation cost and pay an entry fee, or cease competing. Auction rules and information flows are quite general; participation decisions may be simultaneous or sequential. The resulting revenue identity for any auction mechanism implies that optimal auctions are allocatively efficient; a nontrivial reserve price is revenue-inferior for any common-value auction. Characterization of optimal auctions is otherwise contentless, in that any auction that sells without reserve is within the setting of one continuous parameter of an optimal auction; seller's surplus-extracting tools are now substitutes, not complements. Revenue comparisons from the exogenous-bidders literature are upheld in a half-space of parameters, overturned in a half-space. Many econometric studies of auction markets are seen to be flawed in their identifcation of the number of bidders.

Suggested Citation

  • Ronald M. Harstad, 2005. "Rational Participation Revolutionizes Auction Theory," Working Papers 0504, Department of Economics, University of Missouri.
    • Handle: RePEc:umc:wpaper:0504
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://drive.google.com/file/d/13qOJbs6CbzcMN4flhnCQbsd65PQX0ahi/view?usp=sharing
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. French, Kenneth R & McCormick, Robert E, 1984. "Sealed Bids, Sunk Costs, and the Process of Competition," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 57(4), pages 417-441, October.
    2. McAfee, R. Preston & McMillan, John, 1987. "Auctions with a stochastic number of bidders," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 1-19, October.
    3. Ronald M. Harstad & Michael H. Rothkopf, 2000. "An "Alternating Recognition" Model of English Auctions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 46(1), pages 1-12, January.
    4. Roger B. Myerson, 1978. "Optimal Auction Design," Discussion Papers 362, Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science.
    5. Kagel, John H & Levin, Dan & Harstad, Ronald M, 1995. "Comparative Static Effects of Number of Bidders and Public Information on Behavior in Second-Price Common Value Auctions," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 24(3), pages 293-319.
    6. Engelbrecht-Wiggans, Richard, 2001. "The effect of entry and information costs on oral versus sealed-bid auctions," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 70(2), pages 195-202, February.
    7. Bulow, Jeremy & Klemperer, Paul, 1996. "Auctions versus Negotiations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(1), pages 180-194, March.
    8. Eric Maskin & John Riley, 2000. "Equilibrium in Sealed High Bid Auctions," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 67(3), pages 439-454.
    9. Vlad Mares & Ronald Harstad, 2007. "Ex-post full surplus extraction, straightforwardly," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 32(2), pages 399-410, August.
    10. Harstad, Ronald M., 1991. "Asymmetric bidding in second-price, common-value auctions," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 249-252, March.
    11. Paul Klemperer, 1999. "Auction Theory: A Guide to the Literature," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(3), pages 227-286, July.
    12. Paul Klemperer, 2002. "What Really Matters in Auction Design," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 16(1), pages 169-189, Winter.
    13. Milgrom, Paul R & Weber, Robert J, 1982. "A Theory of Auctions and Competitive Bidding," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(5), pages 1089-1122, September.
    14. Michael H. Rothkopf & Ronald M. Harstad, 1994. "Modeling Competitive Bidding: A Critical Essay," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 40(3), pages 364-384, March.
    15. Bikhchandani, Sushil & Riley, John G., 1991. "Equilibria in open common value auctions," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 101-130, February.
    16. Samuelson, William F., 1985. "Competitive bidding with entry costs," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 17(1-2), pages 53-57.
    17. McAfee, R. Preston & McMillan, John, 1987. "Auctions with entry," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 23(4), pages 343-347.
    18. Krishna, Vijay, 2009. "Auction Theory," Elsevier Monographs, Elsevier, edition 2, number 9780123745071.
    19. Rothkopf, Michael H & Harstad, Ronald M, 1995. "Two Models of Bid-Taker Cheating in Vickrey Auctions," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 68(2), pages 257-267, April.
    20. Matthews, Steven, 1987. "Comparing Auctions for Risk Averse Buyers: A Buyer's Point of View," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 55(3), pages 633-646, May.
    21. Robert, Jacques, 1991. "Continuity in auction design," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 169-179, October.
    22. Chakraborty, Indranil & Kosmopoulou, Georgia, 2001. "Auctions with endogenous entry," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 72(2), pages 195-200, August.
    23. Cremer, Jacques & McLean, Richard P, 1985. "Optimal Selling Strategies under Uncertainty for a Discriminating Monopolist When Demands Are Interdependent," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 53(2), pages 345-361, March.
    24. Mares, Vlad & Harstad, Ronald M., 2003. "Private information revelation in common-value auctions," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 109(2), pages 264-282, April.
    25. Paul R. Milgrom, 1978. "Rational Expectations," Discussion Papers 406, Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science.
    26. Levin, Dan & Smith, James L, 1994. "Equilibrium in Auctions with Entry," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(3), pages 585-599, June.
    27. Roger B. Myerson, 1981. "Optimal Auction Design," Mathematics of Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 6(1), pages 58-73, February.
    28. Harstad, Ronald M, 1990. "Alternative Common-Value Auction Procedures: Revenue Comparisons with Free Entry," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(2), pages 421-429, April.
    29. Cremer, Jacques & McLean, Richard P, 1988. "Full Extraction of the Surplus in Bayesian and Dominant Strategy Auctions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 56(6), pages 1247-1257, November.
    30. McAfee, R Preston & McMillan, John & Reny, Philip J, 1989. "Extracting the Surplus in the Common-Value Auction," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(6), pages 1451-1459, November.
    31. McAfee, R Preston & Reny, Philip J, 1992. "Correlated Information and Mechanism Design," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 60(2), pages 395-421, March.
    32. Unknown, 1986. "Letters," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 1(4), pages 1-9.
    33. Harstad, Ronald M. & Kagel, John H. & Levin, Dan, 1990. "Equilibrium bid functions for auctions with an uncertain number of bidders," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 35-40, May.
    34. Paul Klemperer (ed.), 2000. "The Economic Theory of Auctions," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, volume 0, number 1669.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Vlad Mares & Ronald Harstad, 2007. "Ex-post full surplus extraction, straightforwardly," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 32(2), pages 399-410, August.
    2. Mares Vlad & Shor Mikhael, 2012. "On the Competitive Effects of Bidding Syndicates," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 1-33, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ronald M Harstad, 2011. "Endogenous Competition Alters the Structure of Optimal Auctions," ISER Discussion Paper 0816, Institute of Social and Economic Research, Osaka University.
    2. Ronald M. Harstad, 2007. "Does a Seller Really Want Another Bidder?," Working Papers 0711, Department of Economics, University of Missouri.
    3. Habib, Michel A. & Ziegler, Alexandre, 2007. "Why government bonds are sold by auction and corporate bonds by posted-price selling," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 343-367, July.
    4. Vlad Mares & Ronald Harstad, 2007. "Ex-post full surplus extraction, straightforwardly," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 32(2), pages 399-410, August.
    5. Fernando Branco, 1996. "Common value auctions with independent types," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 2(1), pages 283-309, December.
    6. Ronald M. Harstad & Aleksandar Saša Pekeč, 2008. "Relevance to Practice and Auction Theory: A Memorial Essay for Michael Rothkopf," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 38(5), pages 367-380, October.
    7. Levin, Dan & Ozdenoren, Emre, 2004. "Auctions with uncertain numbers of bidders," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 118(2), pages 229-251, October.
    8. Lorentziadis, Panos L., 2016. "Optimal bidding in auctions from a game theory perspective," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 248(2), pages 347-371.
    9. Axel Ockenfels & David Reiley & Abdolkarim Sadrieh, 2006. "Online Auctions," NBER Working Papers 12785, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Vagstad, Steinar, 2007. "Should auctioneers supply early information for prospective bidders?," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 25(3), pages 597-614, June.
    11. Xu, Xiaoshu & Levin, Dan & Ye, Lixin, 2013. "Auctions with entry and resale," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 92-105.
    12. Roberto Burguet, 2000. "Auction theory: a guided tour," Investigaciones Economicas, Fundación SEPI, vol. 24(1), pages 3-50, January.
    13. Tong Li & Xiaoyong Zheng, 2009. "Entry and Competition Effects in First-Price Auctions: Theory and Evidence from Procurement Auctions," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 76(4), pages 1397-1429.
    14. Aleksandar Saša Pekev{c} & Ilia Tsetlin, 2008. "Revenue Ranking of Discriminatory and Uniform Auctions with an Unknown Number of Bidders," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 54(9), pages 1610-1623, September.
    15. Mares, Vlad & Harstad, Ronald M., 2003. "Private information revelation in common-value auctions," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 109(2), pages 264-282, April.
    16. Dominic Coey & Bradley Larsen & Kane Sweeney, 2019. "The bidder exclusion effect," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 50(1), pages 93-120, March.
    17. Michel A. Habib & Alexandre Ziegler, 2003. "Why Government Bonds Are Sold by Auction and Corporate Bonds by Posted-Price Selling," FAME Research Paper Series rp78, International Center for Financial Asset Management and Engineering.
    18. Cao, Xiaoyong & Tian, Guoqiang, 2010. "Equilibria in first price auctions with participation costs," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 69(2), pages 258-273, July.
    19. Flavio Menezes & Paulo Klinger Monteiro, 1996. "A Note on Auctions with Endogenous Participation," Microeconomics 9610003, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 31 Oct 1996.
    20. Hsueh, Shao-Chieh & Tian, Guoqiang, 2009. "Nonratifiability of the Cartel Mechanism in First-Price Sealed-Bid Auction with Participation Costs," MPRA Paper 41202, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Oct 2010.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    optimal auctions; endegenous bidder participation; affiliated-values; common-value auctions; surplus-extracting devices;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D44 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Auctions
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:umc:wpaper:0504. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chao Gu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/edumous.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.