31,986 research outputs found
Market Transparency, Adverse Selection, and Moral Hazard
We study the effects of improvements in market transparency on eBay on seller exit and continuing sellers’ behavior. An improvement in market transparency by reducing strategic bias in buyer ratings led to a significant increase in buyer valuation especially of sellers rated poorly prior to the change, but not to an increase in seller exit. When sellers had the choice between exiting—a reduction in adverse selection—and improved behavior—a reduction in moral hazard—, they preferred the latter because of lower cost. Increasing market transparency improves on market outcomes
Ownership and Control in a Competitive Industry
We study a differentiated product market in which an investor initially owns a controlling stake in one of two competing firms and may acquire a non-controlling or a controlling stake in a competitor, either directly using her own assets, or indirectly via the controlled firm. While industry profits are maximized within a symmetric two product monopoly, the investor attains this only in exceptional cases. Instead, she sometimes acquires a noncontrolling stake. Or she invests asymmetrically rather than pursuing a full takeover if she acquires a controlling one. Generally, she invests indirectly if she only wants to affect the product market outcome, and directly if acquiring shares is profitable per se.Differentiated products; separation of ownership and control; private benefits of control
Last Minute Feedback
Feedback mechanisms that allow partners to rate each other after a transaction are considered crucial for the success of anonymous internet trading platforms. We document an asymmetry in the feedback behavior on eBay, propose an explanation based on the micro structure of the feedback mechanism and the time when feedbacks are given, and support this explanation by findings from a large data set. Our analysis implies that the informational content of feedback records is likely to be low. The reason for this is that agents appear to leave feedbacks strategically. Negative feedbacks are given late, in the "last minute," or not given at all, most likely because of the fear of retaliative negative feedback. Conversely, positive feedbacks are given early in order to encourage reciprocation. Towards refining our insights into the observed pattern, we look separately at buyers and sellers, and relate the magnitude of the effects to the trading partners' experience
Ownership and Control in a Competitive Industry
We study a differentiated product market in which an investor initially owns a controlling stake in one of two competing firms and may acquire a non-controlling or a controlling stake in a competitor, either directly using her own assets, or indirectly via the controlled firm. While industry profits are maximized within a symmetric two product monopoly, the investor attains this only in exceptional cases. Instead, she sometimes acquires a non-controlling stake. Or she invests asymmetrically rather than pursuing a full takeover if she acquires a controlling one. Generally, she invests indirectly if she only wants to affect the product market outcome, and directly if acquiring shares is profitable per se.differentiated products, separation of ownership and control, private benefits of control
The Actual Structure of eBay’s Feedback Mechanism and Early Evidence on the Effects of Recent Changes
eBay’s feedback mechanism is considered crucial to establishing and maintaining trust on the world’s largest trading platform. The effects of a user’s reputation on the probability of sale and on prices are at the center of a large number of studies. More recent theoretical work considers aspects of the mechanism itself. Yet, there is confusion amongst users about its exact institutional details, which also changed substantially in the last few months. An understanding of these details, and how the mechanism is perceived by users, is crucial for any assessment of the system. We provide a thorough description of the institutional setup of eBay’s feedback mechanism, including recent changes to it. Most importantly, buyers now have the possibility to leave additional, anonymous ratings on sellers on four different criteria. We discuss the implications of these changes and provide first descriptive evidence on their impact on rating behavior
Ownership and control in a competitive industry
We study a differentiated product market in which an investor initially owns a controlling stake in one of two competing firms and may acquire a non-controlling or a controlling stake in a competitor, either directly using her own assets, or indirectly via the controlled firm. While industry profits are maximized within a symmetric two product monopoly, the investor attains this only in exceptional cases. Instead, she sometimes acquires a noncontrolling stake. Or she invests asymmetrically rather than pursuing a full takeover if she acquires a controlling one. Generally, she invests indirectly if she only wants to affect the product market outcome, and directly if acquiring shares is profitable per se. --differentiated products,separation of ownership and control,private benefits of control
Microscopic Conductivity of Lattice Fermions at Equilibrium - Part I: Non-Interacting Particles
We consider free lattice fermions subjected to a static bounded potential and
a time- and space-dependent electric field. For any bounded convex region
() of space, electric fields
within drive currents. At leading order, uniformly
with respect to the volume of and
the particular choice of the static potential, the dependency on
of the current is linear and described by a conductivity distribution. Because
of the positivity of the heat production, the real part of its Fourier
transform is a positive measure, named here (microscopic) conductivity measure
of , in accordance with Ohm's law in Fourier space. This finite
measure is the Fourier transform of a time-correlation function of current
fluctuations, i.e., the conductivity distribution satisfies Green-Kubo
relations. We additionally show that this measure can also be seen as the
boundary value of the Laplace-Fourier transform of a so-called quantum current
viscosity. The real and imaginary parts of conductivity distributions satisfy
Kramers-Kronig relations. At leading order, uniformly with respect to
parameters, the heat production is the classical work performed by electric
fields on the system in presence of currents. The conductivity measure is
uniformly bounded with respect to parameters of the system and it is never the
trivial measure . Therefore, electric fields generally
produce heat in such systems. In fact, the conductivity measure defines a
quadratic form in the space of Schwartz functions, the Legendre-Fenchel
transform of which describes the resistivity of the system. This leads to
Joule's law, i.e., the heat produced by currents is proportional to the
resistivity and the square of currents
Relaxing Cosmological Constraints on Large Extra Dimensions
We reconsider cosmological constraints on extra dimension theories from the
excess production of Kaluza-Klein gravitons. We point out that, if the normalcy
temperature is above 1 GeV, then graviton states produced at this temperature
will decay early enough that they do not affect the present day dark matter
density, or the diffuse gamma ray background. We rederive the relevant
cosmological constraints for this scenario.Comment: 17 pages, latex, revtex4; added a short discussion of other
constraints, reference
Classical mappings of the symplectic model and their application to the theory of large-amplitude collective motion
We study the algebra Sp(n,R) of the symplectic model, in particular for the
cases n=1,2,3, in a new way. Starting from the Poisson-bracket realization we
derive a set of partial differential equations for the generators as functions
of classical canonical variables. We obtain a solution to these equations that
represents the classical limit of a boson mapping of the algebra. The
relationship to the collective dynamics is formulated as a theorem that
associates the mapping with an exact solution of the time-dependent Hartree
approximation. This solution determines a decoupled classical symplectic
manifold, thus satisfying the criteria that define an exactly solvable model in
the theory of large amplitude collective motion. The models thus obtained also
provide a test of methods for constructing an approximately decoupled manifold
in fully realistic cases. We show that an algorithm developed in one of our
earlier works reproduces the main results of the theorem.Comment: 23 pages, LaTeX using REVTeX 3.
Exact General Relativistic Thick Disks
A method to construct exact general relativistic thick disks that is a simple
generalization of the ``displace, cut and reflect'' method commonly used in
Newtonian, as well as, in Einstein theory of gravitation is presented. This
generalization consists in the addition of a new step in the above mentioned
method. The new method can be pictured as a ``displace, cut, {\it fill} and
reflect'' method. In the Newtonian case, the method is illustrated in some
detail with the Kuzmin-Toomre disk. We obtain a thick disk with acceptable
physical properties. In the relativistic case two solutions of the Weyl
equations, the Weyl gamma metric (also known as Zipoy-Voorhees metric) and the
Chazy-Curzon metric are used to construct thick disks. Also the Schwarzschild
metric in isotropic coordinates is employed to construct another family of
thick disks. In all the considered cases we have non trivial ranges of the
involved parameter that yield thick disks in which all the energy conditions
are satisfied.Comment: 11 pages, RevTex, 9 eps figs. Accepted for publication in PR
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