Adverse selection, seller reputation and buyer insurance in online auctions for 1960s-era collectible baseball cards

Abstract

We investigate the differences between Beckett book values and eBay auction prices using an original data set of 876 auctions for 30 baseball cards from the 1960s era. We find that cards of lower quality generally sell (on eBay) above book price, whereas cards of higher quality generally sell below book price. We find that both the presence of buyer insurance and the number of bids increase eBay prices relative to book values and that the seller's reputation and the number of bids increase the probability that the eBay price will be greater than the corresponding book value.

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Research Papers in Economics

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Last time updated on 06/07/2012

This paper was published in Research Papers in Economics.

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