We consider an auction environment where an object can be sold with usage restrictions that generate benefits to the seller but decrease buyers' valuations. In this environment, sellers such as the FCC have used "contingent re-auctions," offering the restricted object with a reserve price, but...

We describe and interpret bidding behavior in FCC Auction 73 for the C-block licenses. These licenses were initially offered subject to an open platform restriction, which was highly valued by firms such as Google. Google entered bids until its bids reached the C-block reserve price, thereby...

Carbon allowance auctions are a component of existing and proposed regional cap-and-trade programs in the U.S. and are also included in recent bills in the U.S. Congress that would establish a national cap-and-trade program in the U.S. to regulate greenhouse gases (“carbon”). We discuss and...

In its attempts to deter and prosecute big rigging, U.S. antitrust authorities have focused on sealed-bid procurements, rather than on ascending-bid auctions. One possible justification for this focus is the idea, supported by the existing theoretical literature, that collusion creates...

Carbon allowance auctions are a component of existing and proposed regional cap-and-trade programs in the United States and are also included in recent proposed bills in the U.S. Congress that would establish a national cap-and-trade program to regulate greenhouse gases ("carbon"). We discuss...

Collusive equilibria exist in simultaneous ascending bid auctions with multiple objects, even with large complementarities in the buyers' utility functions. The bidders collude by dividing the objects among themselves, while keeping the prices low. In the most collusive equilibrium the...

In a number of observed procurements, the buyer has employed an auction format that allows for a split-award outcome. We focus on settings where the range of uncertainty regarding scale economies is large and, depending on cost realizations, the efficient allocations include split-award outcomes...