This paper studies the structure of optimal finance contracts in an agency model of outside finance, when investors possess private information. We show that, depending on the intensity of the entrepreneur's moral hazard problem, optimal contracts induce full, partial, or no revelation of the...

This paper studies the incentive of a long run seller to disclose past offers when trading with a sequence of short-run buyers. Compared with the models of mandatory disclosure or mandatory non-disclosure, there is a new set of equilibria generated by allowing flexibility in the disclosure...

This paper studies the incentive of a long run seller to disclose past offers when trading with a sequence of short-run buyers. Compared with the models of mandatory disclosure or mandatory non-disclosure, there is a new set of equilibria generated by allowing flexibility in the disclosure...

We consider a standard persuasion problem in which the receiver’s action and the state of the world are both one-dimensional. Fully characterizing optimal signals when utilities are non-linear is a daunting task. Instead, we develop a general approach to understanding a key qualitative...

The multilayer probability of informed trading (MPIN) model, developed by Ersan (2016), releases the assumption of single type of information events in the original PIN model of Easley et al. (1996). Identification of the number of layers in a dataset is applied through a layer detection...

This paper proposes a model for a certification market with an imperfect testing technology. Such a technology only assures that whenever two products are tested the higher quality product is more likely to pass than the lower quality one. When only one certifier with such testing technology is...

This paper studies asset markets where buyers of assets do not inherit private information from previous owners and must learn asset quality over time. Imperfect information transmission reduces asymmetric information, but also reduces the trading volume, prices and efficiency. This result is...

We study how dynamic research affects information acquisition in financial markets. In our strategic trading model, the trader performs costly research to generate private information but does not always succeed. Optimal research activity responds to market conditions and generates novel...

An entrepreneur contracts with a consultant, who is protected by limited liability, to supply information about the state of a project prior to investing in it. For a given level of investment, a good project succeeds with higher probability than a bad one. The entrepreneur makes an upfront...

I study reputation models in which information about the long-run player's past behavior is dispersed among short-run players. I identify two challenges to reputation building when such information is aggregated via the short-run players' actions. First, when the long-run player's action can...