Knowing your opponents: Information disclosure and auction design

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: McClellan, Andrew
• 署名单位: University of Chicago
• 刊物名称: GAMES AND ECONOMIC BEHAVIOR
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0899-8256
• DOI: 10.1016/j.geb.2023.03.008
• 发表日期: 2023
• 页码: 173-180
• 关键词: Auctions; Common-value; asymmetry; information disclosure

摘要

We study whether an auctioneer should let bidders see their opponents' identities in a common-value second-price auction when bidders are uncertain about whether their opponents are more informed than they are. The presence of information asymmetries among bidders can lead to an exacerbated winner's curse for less informed bidders and large decreases in auction revenue. We find that letting bidders see who their opponents are (and identify if a more informed bidder is present) leads to lower expected revenue than revealing no information about the identities of opposing bidders. Our results provide a simple and easily implementable auction-design recommendation and show the importance of considering what type of information to reveal when designing auctions.(c) 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.