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The determinants of sales on eBay: the case of baseball cards

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  • Jannett Highfill
  • Kevin O'Brien

Abstract

The popularity of online auctions has grown immensely with the eBay site being the largest auction site. One issue that has not received sufficient attention in the eBay auction literature is the effect of reserve-prices (or minimum prices) on the probability of a sale. Studies that have included this variable in their empirical specifications include Lucking-Reiley et al. (2000), Eaton (2002) and Jin and Kato (2002). However, all these studies used the book-price itself to determine its effect on auction outcomes. This study used alternative specifications of the reserve-price to determine if there were different effects of this variable on the probability of sale of baseball cards. These alternative specifications combined the reserve-price with the published book-prices for the baseball cards being sold. None of the three specifications of the reserve-price affected the probability of a sale including a binary variable representing reserve to book-price ratios >2.00. The rationale offered for these results is that there is a geographic mismatch when baseball cards are distributed and eBay extends the reach of the card market, which allows collectors to buy desirable cards at a premium.

Suggested Citation

  • Jannett Highfill & Kevin O'Brien, 2009. "The determinants of sales on eBay: the case of baseball cards," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(14), pages 1421-1424.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:apeclt:v:16:y:2009:i:14:p:1421-1424
    DOI: 10.1080/13504850701493712
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Roger B. Myerson, 1981. "Optimal Auction Design," Mathematics of Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 6(1), pages 58-73, February.
    2. Paul Resnick & Richard Zeckhauser & John Swanson & Kate Lockwood, 2006. "The value of reputation on eBay: A controlled experiment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 9(2), pages 79-101, June.
    3. David Lucking‐Reiley & Doug Bryan & Naghi Prasad & Daniel Reeves, 2007. "Pennies From Ebay: The Determinants Of Price In Online Auctions," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(2), pages 223-233, June.
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    Cited by:

    1. Liu, Kang Ernest & Shiu, Ji-Liang & Sun, Chia-Hung, 2013. "How different are consumers in Internet auction markets? Evidence from Japan and Taiwan," Japan and the World Economy, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 1-12.
    2. Lesley Chiou & Jennifer Pate, 2010. "Internet Auctions and Frictionless Commerce: Evidence from the Retail Gift Card Market," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 36(3), pages 295-304, May.
    3. Jannett Highfill & Kevin O’Brien, 2007. "Bidding and prices for online art auctions: sofa art or investment," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 31(4), pages 279-292, December.
    4. M. R. Vicente, 2015. "Determinants of C2C e-commerce: an empirical analysis of the use of online auction websites among Europeans," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(12), pages 978-981, August.

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