IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wef/wpaper/0045.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

No-Trade in the Laboratory

Author

Listed:
  • Marco Angrisani

    (University College London)

  • Antonio Guarino

    (University College London)

  • Steffen Huck

    (University College London)

  • Nathan Larson

    (University of Virginia)

Abstract

We test the no-trade theorem in a laboratory nancial market where subjects can trade an asset whose value is unknown. Subjects receive clues on the asset value and then set a bid and an ask at which they are willing to buy or to sell from the other participants. In treatments with no gains from trade, theory predicts no trading activity, whereas, in treatments with gains, trade becomes theoretically possible. Our experimental results show that subjects fail to reach the no-trade equilibrium by pure introspection, but they learn to approach it over time, through market feedback and learning.

Suggested Citation

  • Marco Angrisani & Antonio Guarino & Steffen Huck & Nathan Larson, 2008. "No-Trade in the Laboratory," WEF Working Papers 0045, ESRC World Economy and Finance Research Programme, Birkbeck, University of London.
    • Handle: RePEc:wef:wpaper:0045
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.worldeconomyandfinance.org/working_papers_publications/working_paper_PDFs/WEF0045.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lei, Vivian & Noussair, Charles N & Plott, Charles R, 2001. "Nonspeculative Bubbles in Experimental Asset Markets: Lack of Common Knowledge of Rationality vs. Actual Irrationality," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(4), pages 831-859, July.
    2. Marco Cipriani & Antonio Guarino, 2005. "Herd Behavior in a Laboratory Financial Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(5), pages 1427-1443, December.
    3. Milgrom, Paul & Stokey, Nancy, 1982. "Information, trade and common knowledge," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 17-27, February.
    4. Mark Grinblatt & Matti Keloharju, 2001. "What Makes Investors Trade?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 56(2), pages 589-616, April.
    5. Jehiel, Philippe & Koessler, Frédéric, 2008. "Revisiting games of incomplete information with analogy-based expectations," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 62(2), pages 533-557, March.
    6. A. Colin Cameron & Jonah B. Gelbach & Douglas L. Miller, 2008. "Bootstrap-Based Improvements for Inference with Clustered Errors," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(3), pages 414-427, August.
    7. Cameron, A. Colin & Gelbach, Jonah B. & Miller, Douglas L., 2011. "Robust Inference With Multiway Clustering," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 29(2), pages 238-249.
    8. Plott, Charles R & Sunder, Shyam, 1982. "Efficiency of Experimental Security Markets with Insider Information: An Application of Rational-Expectations Models," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 90(4), pages 663-698, August.
    9. Tirole, Jean, 1982. "On the Possibility of Speculation under Rational Expectations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(5), pages 1163-1181, September.
    10. Dow, James & Gorton, Gary, 1997. "Noise Trading, Delegated Portfolio Management, and Economic Welfare," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(5), pages 1024-1050, October.
    11. Morris, Stephen, 1994. "Trade with Heterogeneous Prior Beliefs and Asymmetric Information," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 62(6), pages 1327-1347, November.
    12. Neeman, Zvika, 1996. "Common Beliefs and the Existence of Speculative Trade," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 77-96, September.
    13. Forsythe, Robert & Palfrey, Thomas R & Plott, Charles R, 1982. "Asset Valuation in an Experimental Market," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(3), pages 537-567, May.
    14. Kfir Eliaz & Ran Spiegler, 2007. "A Mechanism-Design Approach to Speculative Trade," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 75(3), pages 875-884, May.
    15. Plott, Charles R & Sunder, Shyam, 1988. "Rational Expectations and the Aggregation of Diverse Information in Laboratory Security Markets," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 56(5), pages 1085-1118, September.
    16. Lawrence Blume & Tarek Coury & David Easley, 2006. "Information, trade and incomplete markets," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 29(2), pages 379-394, October.
    17. Copeland, Thomas E & Friedman, Daniel, 1991. "Partial Revelation of Information in Experimental Asset Markets," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(1), pages 265-295, March.
    18. Duxbury, Darren, 1995. "Experimental Asset Markets within Finance," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(4), pages 331-371, December.
    19. Sonsino, Doron, 1995. ""Impossibility of speculation" theorems with noisy information," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 8(2), pages 406-423.
    20. Nickell, Stephen J, 1981. "Biases in Dynamic Models with Fixed Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(6), pages 1417-1426, November.
    21. Doron Sonsino, 1998. "Geanakoplos and Sebenius model with noise," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 27(1), pages 111-130.
    22. Terrance Odean, 1999. "Do Investors Trade Too Much?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(5), pages 1279-1298, December.
    23. Manuel Arellano & Stephen Bond, 1991. "Some Tests of Specification for Panel Data: Monte Carlo Evidence and an Application to Employment Equations," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 58(2), pages 277-297.
    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. Carrillo, Juan D. & Palfrey, Thomas R., 2011. "No trade," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 66-87, January.
    2. Philippe Aghion & Ernst Fehr & Richard Holden & Tom Wilkening, 2018. "The Role of Bounded Rationality and Imperfect Information in Subgame Perfect Implementation—An Empirical Investigation," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 16(1), pages 232-274.
    3. Wenner, Lukas M., 2018. "Do sellers exploit biased beliefs of buyers? An experiment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 194-215.
    4. Kleinlercher, Daniel & Stöckl, Thomas, 2021. "Thou shalt not trade—An analysis of the violations of no-trade predictions in experimental asset markets," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 32(C).
    5. Ruiz-Buforn, Alba & Camacho-Cuena, Eva & Morone, Andrea & Alfarano, Simone, 2021. "Overweighting of public information in financial markets: A lesson from the lab," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    6. Andrea Morone & Simone Nuzzo, 2019. "Market efficiency, trading institutions and information mirages: evidence from a laboratory asset market," Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination, Springer;Society for Economic Science with Heterogeneous Interacting Agents, vol. 14(2), pages 317-344, June.
    7. Morone, Andrea & Nuzzo, Simone, 2016. "Do Markets (Institutions) Drive Out Lemmings or Vice Versa?," MPRA Paper 74322, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Page, Lionel & Siemroth, Christoph, 2017. "An experimental analysis of information acquisition in prediction markets," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 354-378.
    9. Hoppe, Eva I. & Schmitz, Patrick W., 2015. "Do sellers offer menus of contracts to separate buyer types? An experimental test of adverse selection theory," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 17-33.
    10. Morone, Andrea & Nuzzo, Simone, 2015. "Market Efficiency, Trading Institutions and Information Mirages: evidence from an experimental asset market," MPRA Paper 67448, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Ruiz-Buforn, Alba & Alfarano, Simone & Camacho-Cuena, Eva & Morone, Andrea, 2018. "Crowding out effect and traders' overreliance on public information in financial markets: a lesson from the lab," MPRA Paper 88866, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    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. Jason Shachat & Anand Srinivasan, 2022. "Informational Price Cascades and Non-Aggregation of Asymmetric Information in Experimental Asset Markets," Journal of Behavioral Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(4), pages 388-407, November.
    2. Nuzzo, Simone & Morone, Andrea, 2017. "Asset markets in the lab: A literature review," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 13(C), pages 42-50.
    3. Carl Plat, 2005. "A Double Auction Market with Signals of Varying Precision," Experimental 0508004, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Hales, Jeffrey, 2009. "Are investors really willing to agree to disagree? An experimental investigation of how disagreement and attention to disagreement affect trading behavior," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 108(2), pages 230-241, March.
    5. Carrillo, Juan D. & Palfrey, Thomas R., 2011. "No trade," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 66-87, January.
    6. Corgnet, Brice & Kujal, Praveen & Porter, David, 2010. "The effect of reliability, content and timing of public announcements on asset trading behavior," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 76(2), pages 254-266, November.
    7. Edward Halim & Yohanes E. Riyanto & Nilanjan Roy, 2019. "Costly Information Acquisition, Social Networks, and Asset Prices: Experimental Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 74(4), pages 1975-2010, August.
    8. Markus Glaser & Martin Weber, 2007. "Overconfidence and trading volume," The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance Theory, Springer;International Association for the Study of Insurance Economics (The Geneva Association), vol. 32(1), pages 1-36, June.
    9. Morone, Andrea & Nuzzo, Simone, 2015. "Market Efficiency, Trading Institutions and Information Mirages: evidence from an experimental asset market," MPRA Paper 67448, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Keser, Claudia & Markstädter, Andreas, 2014. "Informational asymmetries in laboratory asset markets with state-dependent fundamentals," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 207, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    11. Claudia Keser & Andreas Markstädter, 2014. "Informational Asymmetries in Laboratory Asset Markets with State-Dependent Fundamentals," CIRANO Working Papers 2014s-30, CIRANO.
    12. Hirota, Shinichi & Huber, Juergen & Stöckl, Thomas & Sunder, Shyam, 2022. "Speculation, money supply and price indeterminacy in financial markets: An experimental study," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 200(C), pages 1275-1296.
    13. Kleinlercher, Daniel & Stöckl, Thomas, 2021. "Thou shalt not trade—An analysis of the violations of no-trade predictions in experimental asset markets," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 32(C).
    14. Martin Barner & Francesco Feri & Charles R. Plott, 2005. "On the microstructure of price determination and information aggregation with sequential and asymmetric information arrival in an experimental asset market," Annals of Finance, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 73-107, January.
    15. Gary Charness & Uri Gneezy, 2010. "Portfolio Choice And Risk Attitudes: An Experiment," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 48(1), pages 133-146, January.
    16. Keser, Claudia & Markstädter, Andreas, 2014. "Informational asymmetries in laboratory asset markets with state-dependent fundamentals," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 207 [rev.], University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    17. Robert M. Gillenkirch & Achim Hendriks & Susanne A. Welker, 2014. "Effects of Executive Compensation Complexity on Investor Behaviour in an Experimental Stock Market," European Accounting Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 23(4), pages 625-645, December.
    18. Shinichi Hirota & Juergen Huber & Thomas Stock & Shyam Sunder, 2018. "Speculation and Price Indeterminacy in Financial Markets: An Experimental Study," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 2134, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    19. Charles N. Noussair & Steven Tucker, 2013. "Experimental Research On Asset Pricing," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 554-569, July.
    20. Markstädter, Andreas & Keser, Claudia, 2014. "Informational Asymmetries in Laboratory Asset Markets with State Dependent Fundamentals," VfS Annual Conference 2014 (Hamburg): Evidence-based Economic Policy 100359, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • C92 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Group Behavior
    • D80 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - General
    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading

    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:wef:wpaper:0045. 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: Tim Byne (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/debbkuk.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.