In this paper, we examine the optimal mechanism design of selling an indivisible object to one regular buyer and one publicly known buyer, where inter-buyer resale cannot be prohibited. The resale market is modeled as a stochastic ultimatum bargaining game between the two buyers. We fully...

In this paper we analyze sequencing situations under incomplete information where agents have interdependent costs. We first argue why Vickrey-Clarke-Groves (or VCG) mechanism fails to implement a simple sequencing problem in dominant strategies. Given this impossibility, we try to implement...

In mechanism design problems under incomplete information, it is generally difficult to find decision problems that are first best implementable. A decision problem under incomplete information is first best implementable if there exists a mechanism that extracts the private information and...

In an incomplete information setting, we analyze the sealed bid auction proposed by Knaster (cf. Steinhaus (1948)). This procedure was designed to efficiently and fairly allocate multiple indivisible items when participants report their valuations truthfully. In equilibrium, players do not...

During the recent sales of UMTS licenses in Europe some countries used auctions while others resorted to so-called Beauty Contests. There seems to be a wide consensus among economists that in these and other contexts like privatisation an auction is the better selling mechanism. However, why...

We consider situations where a society tries to efficiently allocate several homogeneous and indivisible goods among agents. Each agent receives at most one unit of the good. For example, suppose that a government wishes to allocate a fixed number of licenses to operate in its country to private...

During the recent sales of UMTS licenses in Europe some countries used auctions while others resorted to so-called Beauty Contests. There seems to be a wide consensus among economists that in these and other contexts like privatisation an auction is the better selling mechanism. However, why...

The paper reports on an experiment on two-player double-auction bargaining with private values. We consider a setting with discrete two-point overlapping distributions of traders' valuations, in which there exists a fully efficient equilibrium. We show that if there are traders that behave...

In light of recent developments in auction theory, this Article re-examines Delaware corporate law governing directors' actions when structuring the sale of a corporation. A foundational doctrine of Delaware law is that when the board of directors resolves to sell a corporation, it must obtain...

We consider situations where a society tries to efficiently allocate several homogeneous and indivisible goods among agents. Each agent receives at most one unit of the good. For example, suppose that a government wishes to allocate a fixed number of licenses to operate in its country to private...