IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/aecrev/v97y2007i1p260-276.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Credible Sales Mechanisms and Intermediaries

Author

Listed:
  • David McAdams
  • Michael Schwarz

Abstract

We consider a seller who faces several buyers and lacks access to an institution to credibly close a sale. If buyers anticipate that the seller may negotiate further, they will prefer to wait before making their best and final offers. This in turn induces the seller to bargain at length with buyers, even if doing so is costly. When the seller's cost of soliciting another round of offers is either very large or very small, the seller credibly commits to an auction and experiences negligible bargaining costs. Otherwise, there may be several rounds of increasing offers and significant seller losses. In these situations, an intermediary with a sufficiently valuable reputation and/or weak marginal incentives regarding price can create value by credibly committing to help sell the object without delay. (JEL C78, D44)

Suggested Citation

  • David McAdams & Michael Schwarz, 2007. "Credible Sales Mechanisms and Intermediaries," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(1), pages 260-276, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:97:y:2007:i:1:p:260-276
    Note: DOI: 10.1257/aer.97.1.260
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.aeaweb.org/articles.php?doi=10.1257/aer.97.1.260
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: http://www.aeaweb.org/aer/data/mar07/20060453_app.pdf
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Paul Klemperer, 2002. "What Really Matters in Auction Design," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 16(1), pages 169-189, Winter.
    2. Hannu Vartiainen, 2003. "Auction Design without Commitment," Working Papers 2003.24, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    3. Bester, Helmut, 1994. "Price commitment in search markets," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 109-120, September.
    4. David Lucking-Reiley, 2000. "Vickrey Auctions in Practice: From Nineteenth-Century Philately to Twenty-First-Century E-Commerce," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 183-192, Summer.
    5. Bester, Helmut & Sakovics, Jozsef, 2001. "Delegated bargaining and renegotiation," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 45(4), pages 459-473, August.
    6. Glenn Ellison & Drew Fudenberg & Markus Möbius, 2004. "Competing Auctions," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 2(1), pages 30-66, March.
    7. Marc S. Robinson, 1985. "Collusion and the Choice of Auction," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 16(1), pages 141-145, Spring.
    8. Sobel, Joel, 1981. "Distortion of Utilities and the Bargaining Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(3), pages 597-619, May.
    9. Rothkopf, Michael H & Teisberg, Thomas J & Kahn, Edward P, 1990. "Why Are Vickrey Auctions Rare?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(1), pages 94-109, February.
    10. Hannu Vartiainen, 2013. "Auction Design Without Commitment," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 11(2), pages 316-342, April.
    11. McAdams, David & Schwarz, Michael, 2007. "Who pays when auction rules are bent?," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 25(5), pages 1144-1157, October.
    12. Vasiliki Skreta, 2006. "Sequentially Optimal Mechanisms -super-1," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 73(4), pages 1085-1111.
    13. McLaughlin, Robyn M., 1990. "Investment-banking contracts in tender offers : An empirical analysis," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(1-2), pages 209-232.
    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. Laura Doval & Vasiliki Skreta, 2022. "Mechanism Design With Limited Commitment," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 90(4), pages 1463-1500, July.
    2. Johannes Hörner & Larry Samuelson, 2011. "Managing Strategic Buyers," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 119(3), pages 379-425.
    3. Tanjim Hossain & Fahad Khalil & Matthew Shum, 2016. "Auctioneers as Market Makers: Managing Momentum in Chittagong Tea Auctions," CESifo Working Paper Series 5843, CESifo.
    4. Jeremy Bulow & Paul Klemperer, 2009. "Why Do Sellers (Usually) Prefer Auctions?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(4), pages 1544-1575, September.
    5. Hernando-Veciana, Ángel & Tröge, Michael, 2011. "The insider's curse," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 339-350, March.
    6. Onur A. Koska & Ilke Onur & Frank Stähler, 2018. "The scope of auctions in the presence of downstream interactions and information externalities," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 125(2), pages 107-136, October.
    7. Thomas, Charles J., 2018. "An alternating-offers model of multilateral negotiations," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 269-293.
    8. Skreta, Vasiliki, 2015. "Optimal auction design under non-commitment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 159(PB), pages 854-890.
    9. Koska, Onur A. & Stähler, Frank, 2021. "It ain’t over until it’s over: English auctions with subsequent negotiations," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 121-124.
    10. Paul Milgrom, 2006. "Incentives in Core-Selecting Auctions," Levine's Bibliography 321307000000000503, UCLA Department of Economics.
    11. van den Brink, René & Katsev, Ilya & van der Laan, Gerard, 2010. "An algorithm for computing the nucleolus of disjunctive non-negative additive games with an acyclic permission structure," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 207(2), pages 817-826, December.
    12. Lin William Cong, 2020. "Timing of Auctions of Real Options," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(9), pages 3956-3976, September.
    13. Jeremy Bulow & Paul Klemperer, 2009. "Why Do Sellers (Usually) Prefer Auctions?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(4), pages 1544-75, 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. McAdams, David & Schwarz, Michael, 2007. "Who pays when auction rules are bent?," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 25(5), pages 1144-1157, October.
    2. Michael H. Rothkopf, 2007. "Thirteen Reasons Why the Vickrey-Clarke-Groves Process Is Not Practical," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 55(2), pages 191-197, April.
    3. Skreta, Vasiliki, 2015. "Optimal auction design under non-commitment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 159(PB), pages 854-890.
    4. De Liu & Adib Bagh, 2020. "Preserving Bidder Privacy in Assignment Auctions: Design and Measurement," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(7), pages 3162-3182, July.
    5. Gretschko, Vitali & Wambach, Achim, 2015. "Common Values and the Coase Conjecture: Inefficiencies in Frictionless Contract (Re-)Negotiation," VfS Annual Conference 2015 (Muenster): Economic Development - Theory and Policy 113064, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    6. Gretschko, Vitali & Wambach, Achim, 2017. "Contract Design With Limited Commitment," VfS Annual Conference 2017 (Vienna): Alternative Structures for Money and Banking 168269, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    7. Hinloopen, Jeroen & Onderstal, Sander, 2014. "Going once, going twice, reported! Cartel activity and the effectiveness of antitrust policies in experimental auctions," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 317-336.
    8. Dirk Bergemann & Benjamin Brooks & Stephen Morris, 2016. "Selling to Intermediaries: Optimal Auction Design in a Common Value Model," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 2064R, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University, revised Jul 2017.
    9. Azacis, Helmuts & Burguet, Roberto, 2008. "Incumbency and entry in license auctions: The Anglo-Dutch auction meets another simple alternative," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 730-745, May.
    10. Aniol Llorente-Saguer & Ro’i Zultan, 2014. "Auction Mechanisms And Bidder Collusion: Bribes, Signals And Selection," Working Papers 1406, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Department of Economics.
    11. Hu, Audrey & Offerman, Theo & Onderstal, Sander, 2011. "Fighting collusion in auctions: An experimental investigation," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 84-96, January.
    12. Qingmin Liu & Konrad Mierendorff & Xianwen Shi & Weijie Zhong, 2019. "Auctions with Limited Commitment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(3), pages 876-910, March.
    13. Axel Ockenfels & David Reiley & Abdolkarim Sadrieh, 2006. "Online Auctions," NBER Working Papers 12785, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Paul Klemperer, 2002. "What Really Matters in Auction Design," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 16(1), pages 169-189, Winter.
    15. Natalia Fabra & Nils‐Henrik Fehr & David Harbord, 2006. "Designing electricity auctions," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 37(1), pages 23-46, March.
    16. Ceesay, Muhammed, 2023. "Secret vs Public Rings in Common Value Auctions," EconStor Preprints 279484, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    17. Ahrash Dianat & Mikhail Freer, 2024. "Credibility in second-price auctions: an experimental test," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 27(1), pages 58-79, March.
    18. Mohammad Akbarpour & Shengwu Li, 2020. "Credible Auctions: A Trilemma," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 88(2), pages 425-467, March.
    19. Emiel Maasland & Sander Onderstal, 2006. "Going, Going, Gone! A Swift Tour of Auction Theory and its Applications," De Economist, Springer, vol. 154(2), pages 197-249, June.
    20. Walter Orellana Rocha & Bernardo X. Fernández Tellería & Vladimir Fernández Quiroga, 2006. "Subasta electrónica interactiva y subasta a sobre cerrado: Un análisis comparativo de los resultados en Bolivia," Revista de Análisis del BCB, Banco Central de Bolivia, vol. 9(1), pages 65-113, December.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • C78 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Bargaining Theory; Matching Theory
    • D44 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Auctions

    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:aea:aecrev:v:97:y:2007:i:1:p:260-276. 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: Michael P. Albert (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aeaaaea.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.