We characterize optimal selling protocols/equilibria of a game in which an Agent first puts hidden effort to acquire information and then transacts with a Firm that uses this information to take a decision. We determine the equilibrium payoffs that maximize incentives to acquire information. Our...

An Agent who owns information that is potentially valuable to a Firm bargains for its sale, without commitment and certification possibilities, short of disclosing it. We propose a model of gradual persuasion and show how gradualism helps mitigate the hold-up problem (that the Firm would not pay...

We analyze the welfare consequences of a monopolist having additional information about consumers' tastes, beyond the prior distribution; the additional information can be used to charge different prices to different segments of the market, i.e., carry out "third degree price discrimination."We...

A partially informed expert, A, strategically transmits information to a principal, P. The residual uncertainty faced by the expert effectively causes the bias between P and A to be random, with two consequences. First, by misreporting A is likely to induce a decision choice by P, after the...

We study an adverse-selection model in which the distribution of the asset is affected by unobservable actions of the seller. The seller's equilibrium behavior is characterized by a risk-seeking disposition, and a competitive market, in which the underlying distribution of the traded asset is...

I analyse a market with asymmetric information, interdependent values and trade frictions. The frictions can be reduced at a cost, e.g. by increasing attention, search, lobbying or computing power. For some parameters, there is a unique equilibrium in which an increase in the gains from trade...

This paper compares centralized and decentralized policymaking in a game theoretic model of informational lobbying and political contributions. In the model, an interest group first produces verifiable evidence about the welfare effects of its preferred policy and then engages in monetary...

We analyze a cheap talk model in which an informed sender and an uninformed receiver engage in finite-period communication before the receiver chooses a project. During the communication phase, in each period, the sender sends a cheap talk message and the receiver voluntarily pays money for the...

The problem of optimally designing information for multiple agents who interact in a game can be formulated as a linear program. We explore its dual representation and show that it provides a novel perspective and new economic insights into the information-design problem. Through the lens of the...

We consider demand function competition with a finite number of agents and private information. We analyze how the structure of the private information shapes the market power of each agent and the price volatility. We show that any degree of market power can arise in the unique equilibrium...