How Efficient are Decentralized Auction Platforms?
研究了去中心化动态拍卖市场的效率，基于eBay上Kindle销售数据发现超过三分之一的拍卖导致无谓损失，占市场总剩余14%，并探讨了部分集中化拍卖的改进效果。
Abstract We model a decentralized, dynamic auction market platform in which a continuum of buyers and sellers participate in simultaneous, single-unit auctions each period. Our model accounts for the endogenous entry of agents and the impact of intertemporal optimization on bids. We estimate the structural primitives of our model using Kindle sales on eBay. We find that just over one-third of Kindle auctions on eBay result in an inefficient allocation with deadweight loss amounting to 14% of total possible market surplus. We also find that partial centralization—for example, running half as many 2-unit, uniform-price auctions each day—would eliminate a large fraction of the inefficiency, but yield lower seller revenues. Our results also highlight the importance of understanding platform composition effects—selection of agents into the market—in assessing the implications of market redesign. We also prove that the equilibrium of our model with a continuum of buyers and sellers is an approximate equilibrium of the analogous model with a finite number of agents.