Background: This paper explores the financial viability of eBay's Buyer Protection Plan. Methods: We explore their warranty model assuming exponential auction listing and claims times, under competing assumptions of Normal (classical portfolio theory) versus Paretian claims (industry practice)...

Market data for financial studies typically derives from either historical transactions or contemporaneous surveys of sentiment and perceptions. The research communities analyzing data from these opposing categories of source data see themselves as distinct, with advantages not shared by the...