IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/90620.html

Information design in the holdup problem

Author

Listed:
  • Condorelli, Daniele
  • Szentes, Balázs

Abstract

We analyze a bilateral trade model where the buyer chooses the distribution of her valuation for the good. The seller, after observing the buyer’s distribution but not the realized valuation, makes a take-it-or-leave-it offer. If distributions are costless, the price and the payoffs of both the buyer and the seller are shown to be 1=e in the unique equilibrium outcome. The buyer’s equilibrium distribution generates a unit-elastic demand, and trade is ex post efficient. These properties are shown to be preserved even when different distributions are differentially costly as long as the cost is monotone in the dispersion of the distribution.

Suggested Citation

  • Condorelli, Daniele & Szentes, Balázs, 2020. "Information design in the holdup problem," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 90620, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:90620
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://researchonline.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/90620/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gul, Faruk, 2001. "Unobservable Investment and the Hold-Up Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(2), pages 343-376, March.
    2. Dirk Bergemann & Karl H. Schlag, 2012. "Pricing Without Priors," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Robust Mechanism Design The Role of Private Information and Higher Order Beliefs, chapter 12, pages 405-415, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    3. Dirk Bergemann & Benjamin Brooks & Stephen Morris, 2015. "The Limits of Price Discrimination," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(3), pages 921-957, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Arieli, Itai & Babichenko, Yakov & Madmon, Omer & Tennenholtz, Moshe, 2025. "Robust price discrimination," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 154(C), pages 377-395.
    2. Król, Michał, 2012. "Product differentiation decisions under ambiguous consumer demand and pessimistic expectations," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 30(6), pages 593-604.
    3. Stephanie Rosenkranz & Patrick W. Schmitz, 2007. "Can Coasean Bargaining Justify Pigouvian Taxation?," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 74(296), pages 573-585, November.
    4. Lau, Stephanie, 2011. "Investment incentives in bilateral trading," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 538-552.
    5. Tim S. G. van Eck & Pieter Kleer & Johan S. H. van Leeuwaarden, 2026. "Distributionally Robust Monopoly Pricing: Switching from Low to High Prices in Volatile Markets," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 28(4), pages 1248-1265, July.
    6. Dirk Bergemann & Alessandro Bonatti, 2024. "Data, Competition, and Digital Platforms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 114(8), pages 2553-2595, August.
    7. Rahul Deb & Anne-Katrin Roesler, 2024. "Multi-Dimensional Screening: Buyer-Optimal Learning and Informational Robustness," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 91(5), pages 2744-2770.
    8. Schmitz, Patrick W., 2012. "Public goods and the hold-up problem under asymmetric information," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 117(3), pages 642-645.
    9. Tan, Lihua & Yang, Zhaojun, 2025. "Optimal equity split under unobservable investments," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    10. Kocourek, Pavel & Steiner, Jakub & Stewart, Colin, 2024. "Boundedly rational demand," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 19(4), November.
    11. Patrick Gonzàlez, 2004. "Investment and Screening Under Asymmetric Endogenous Information," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 35(3), pages 502-519, Autumn.
    12. Asseyer, Andreas, 2020. "Collusion and delegation under information control," Discussion Papers 2020/3, Free University Berlin, School of Business & Economics.
    13. Garrett, Daniel F., 2021. "Payoff implications of incentive contracting," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 16(4), November.
    14. Andreas Leibbrandt, 2016. "Behavioral Constraints on Pricing: Experimental Evidence on Price Discrimination and Customer Antagonism," CESifo Working Paper Series 6214, CESifo.
    15. Dirk Bergemann & Benjamin Brooks & Stephen Morris, 2015. "The Limits of Price Discrimination," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(3), pages 921-957, March.
    16. Martin Szydlowski, 2012. "Ambiguity in Dynamic Contracts," Discussion Papers 1543, Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science.
    17. Galasso, Alberto & Mitchell, Matthew & Virag, Gabor, 2018. "A theory of grand innovation prizes," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 343-362.
    18. Ohlendorf, Susanne & Schmitz, Patrick, 2009. "Signaling an Outside Option," Discussion Paper Series of SFB/TR 15 Governance and the Efficiency of Economic Systems 281, Free University of Berlin, Humboldt University of Berlin, University of Bonn, University of Mannheim, University of Munich.
    19. von Siemens, Ferdinand A., 2009. "Bargaining under incomplete information, fairness, and the hold-up problem," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 486-494, August.
    20. Tommaso Denti & Doron Ravid, 2023. "Robust Predictions in Games with Rational Inattention," Papers 2306.09964, arXiv.org.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • L81 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Retail and Wholesale Trade; e-Commerce

    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:ehl:lserod:90620. 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: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.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.