Predicting Auction Price of Vehicle License Plate with Deep Residual Learning

Due to superstition, license plates with desirable combinations of characters are highly sought after in China, fetching prices that can reach into the millions in government-held auctions. Despite the high stakes involved, there has been essentially no attempt to provide price estimates for license plates. We present an end-to-end neural network model that simultaneously predict the auction price, gives the distribution of prices and produces latent feature vectors. While both types of neural network architectures we consider outperform simpler machine learning methods, convolutional networks outperform recurrent networks for comparable training time or model complexity. The resulting model powers our online price estimator and search engine

The probability of sale and price premiums in withdrawn auctioned properties

This paper examines the impact of the auction process of residential properties that whilst unsuccessful at auction sold subsequently. The empirical analysis considers both the probability of sale and the premium of the subsequent sale price over the guide price, reserve and opening bid. The findings highlight that the final achieved sale price is influenced by key price variables revealed both prior to and during the auction itself. Factors such as auction participation, the number of individual bidders and the number of bids are significant in a number of the alternative specifications

Conclusion : what's next ?

This book offered a broad overview of the different business models in the wine industry worldwide. It showed the diversity of this highly fragmented and extremely diverse sector. Above all, the different chapters showed that there is no dominant model and no guarantee of success at national scale in whatever we are talking about Old, New or New World wine countries. In particular, this book refutes the idea, however widespread in the Old World, that the model of the large, vertically integrated industries relying on one or more strong brands sold internationally would be the unique way for success in wine-producing countries. (...

Analysis of No-Difference Findings in Evaluation Research

Conclusions of no difference are becoming increasingly important in evaluation research. We delineate three major uses of no-difference findings and analyze their meanings. (1) No-differ ence findings in randomized experiments can be interpreted as support for conclusions of the absence of a meaningful treatment effect, but only if the proper analytic methods are used. (2) Statistically based conclusions in quasi-experiments do not allow causal statements about the treatment impact but do provide a metric to judge the size of the resulting difference. (3) Using no-difference findings to conclude equivalence on control variables is inefficient and potentially misleading. The final section of the article presents alternative methods by which conclusions of no difference may be supported when applicable. These methods include the use of arbitrarily high alpha levels, interval estimation, and power analysis.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/67182/2/10.1177_0193841X8901300604.pd

A comparison of arbitration procedures for risk averse disputants

We propose an arbitration model framework that generalizes many previous quantitative models of final offer arbitration, conventional arbitration, and some proposed alternatives to them. Our model allows the two disputants to be risk averse and assumes that the issue(s) in dispute can be summarized by a single quantifiable value. We compare the performance of the different arbitration procedures by analyzing the gap between the disputants' equilibrium offers and the width of the contract zone that these offers imply. Our results suggest that final offer arbitration should give results superior to those of conventional arbitration.Natural Sciences & Engineering Research Council (NSERC) Discovery Gran

Merger Externalities in Oligopolistic Markets

We quantify externalities on profitability and market shares of competing firms in oligopolistic markets through the transition from an n to an n - 1 player oligopoly after a merger. Competitors are identified via the European Commission's market investigations and our methodology allows us to distinguish the externality due to the change in market structure from the merger effect. We obtain results consistent with the predictions of standard oligopoly models: rivals expand their output and increase their profits, whereas merging firms are negatively affected. This indicates that on average the market power effects of large mergers outweigh the efficiencies

Price indices for artists - A proposal

This paper proposes a price index for artists based on the ratio between the average market price and the average estimated price of the paintings sold by an artist each year, adjusted for market dynamics. We apply this methodology to a group of selected artists and schools drawing from a database including auction prices and estimated prices of paintings presented in auctions world wide between 1990 and 2001. A comparison with quality unadjusted and hedonic indices is also proposed

The Effect of Bound Dineutrons upon BBN

We have examined the effects of a bound dineutron, n2, upon big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) as a function of its binding energy B_n2. We find a weakly bound dineutron has little impact but as B_n2 increases its presence begins to alter the flow of free nucleons to helium-4. Due to this disruption, and in the absence of changes to other binding energies or fundamental constants, BBN sets a reliable upper limit of B_n2 <~ 2.5 MeV in order to maintain the agreement with the observations of the primordial helium-4 mass fraction and D/H abundance

Is the lower return to immigrants’ foreign schooling a postarrival problem in Canada?

Published versionUsing the 2006 Canadian Census, this paper investigates the lower return to immigrants’ foreign education credentials after adjusting for their occupational matching in hosting labor markets. We develop two continuous indices that quantify the matching quality of the native-born in both horizontal (fields of study) and vertical (educational degrees) dimensions. This allows us to separate the effects of immigrants’ occupational attainment and their foreign schooling quality on wage earnings by measuring immigrants’ occupational match relative to that of native-born. Our findings indicate that the lack of portability in immigrants’ foreign credentials may not be addressed effectively by post arrival policies as the results show that a significant and persistent poor matching quality for internationally educated immigrants cannot substantiate the lower return to their foreign education credentials