Project acronym INFORMATIVEPRICES
Project Market Selection, Frictions, and the Information Content of Prices
Researcher (PI) Alp Enver Atakan
Host Institution (HI) KOC UNIVERSITY
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH1, ERC-2015-CoG
Summary This project studies information aggregation in multiple-linked auction markets with large numbers of goods and bidders. Past work assumes bidders trade in a single, centralized, frictionless auction market. Instead, I study bidders with unit demand who decide to purchase one of many possible goods which are on auction in distinct markets. The goods traded in each market are identical, common-value objects and the price is determined by a uniform-price auction. Bidders receive imperfect signals about the state of the world and select to bid in one of the auction markets. The markets differ in institutional structure and therefore frictions. Market frictions result from imperfect competition, government interventions, informational frictions, and preference heterogeneity. All such frictions render the gains from trade uncertain.
I address the following questions: How do market frictions affect information aggregation if bidders can strategically choose between markets? What are the mechanisms through which market imperfections disrupt information aggregation? Which market’s price is a better statistic for market participants’ information? Which market attracts better-informed bidders? Do prices aggregate beliefs more accurately in good times or in bad?
Initial findings suggest that the proposed framework can prove particularly fruitful in addressing these questions. Specifically, I show if the gains from trade are uncertain in even one market, then prices do not aggregate information in any of the markets. In contrast, if all markets are frictionless, then the price in each market aggregates information. These findings are driven by how bidders self-select across markets: Better-informed bidders select frictional markets while uninformed, pessimistic bidders select the safety of frictionless markets. These findings suggest a novel mechanism through which market imperfections in one market can have widespread effects across all linked markets.
Summary
This project studies information aggregation in multiple-linked auction markets with large numbers of goods and bidders. Past work assumes bidders trade in a single, centralized, frictionless auction market. Instead, I study bidders with unit demand who decide to purchase one of many possible goods which are on auction in distinct markets. The goods traded in each market are identical, common-value objects and the price is determined by a uniform-price auction. Bidders receive imperfect signals about the state of the world and select to bid in one of the auction markets. The markets differ in institutional structure and therefore frictions. Market frictions result from imperfect competition, government interventions, informational frictions, and preference heterogeneity. All such frictions render the gains from trade uncertain.
I address the following questions: How do market frictions affect information aggregation if bidders can strategically choose between markets? What are the mechanisms through which market imperfections disrupt information aggregation? Which market’s price is a better statistic for market participants’ information? Which market attracts better-informed bidders? Do prices aggregate beliefs more accurately in good times or in bad?
Initial findings suggest that the proposed framework can prove particularly fruitful in addressing these questions. Specifically, I show if the gains from trade are uncertain in even one market, then prices do not aggregate information in any of the markets. In contrast, if all markets are frictionless, then the price in each market aggregates information. These findings are driven by how bidders self-select across markets: Better-informed bidders select frictional markets while uninformed, pessimistic bidders select the safety of frictionless markets. These findings suggest a novel mechanism through which market imperfections in one market can have widespread effects across all linked markets.
Max ERC Funding
1 089 432 €
Duration
Start date: 2016-05-01, End date: 2021-04-30
Project acronym TEA
Project Theory and Empirics of Asymmetry
Researcher (PI) Refet GURKAYNAK
Host Institution (HI) BILKENT UNIVERSITESI VAKIF
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH1, ERC-2016-COG
Summary Why is there a Volcker disinflation but no Bernanke re-inflation? It is not only because of the zero lower bound as a nascent literature is suggesting that monetary policy is more potent in a contractionary stance than in an expansionary stance away from the ZLB as well. But why? Why is it that central banks cut interest rates much faster than they raise them? Why does it seem like financial markets give much different responses to seemingly similar macroeconomic news at different times? Are these all related?
This research project is about asymmetries in macroeconomics and finance. I will be working on these questions because our current understanding of these issues hints at some facets of asymmetries but is a long way from providing broad evidence and matching theories. I find these questions thoroughly interesting because the theory and empirical evidence we now have lets us ask the questions and understand their research and policy relevance but not yet satisfactorily answer them.
Most of our macroeconomic models are linearized and linear models (with exceptions that effectively make the model piece-wise linear) do not generate asymmetric anything. But the issue is not in the solution method: nonlinear solutions of standard models also do not produce asymmetric responses in noticeable ways. Hence, although by experience we understand there are likely sizable asymmetries in macroeconomic and financial outcomes, we have neither extensively documented these nor understood what brings them about.
This research program, then, will consist of five distinct but related questions:
1. Are there asymmetries due to the state of the business cycle and the nature of the shock?
2. Do financial markets behave as if market participants perceive the world to be asymmetric?
3. Do policymakers behave asymmetrically and if so why?
4. To the extent that there are asymmetries, what brings them about?
5. What kinds of policies should we be thinking of in a world with asymmetries?
Summary
Why is there a Volcker disinflation but no Bernanke re-inflation? It is not only because of the zero lower bound as a nascent literature is suggesting that monetary policy is more potent in a contractionary stance than in an expansionary stance away from the ZLB as well. But why? Why is it that central banks cut interest rates much faster than they raise them? Why does it seem like financial markets give much different responses to seemingly similar macroeconomic news at different times? Are these all related?
This research project is about asymmetries in macroeconomics and finance. I will be working on these questions because our current understanding of these issues hints at some facets of asymmetries but is a long way from providing broad evidence and matching theories. I find these questions thoroughly interesting because the theory and empirical evidence we now have lets us ask the questions and understand their research and policy relevance but not yet satisfactorily answer them.
Most of our macroeconomic models are linearized and linear models (with exceptions that effectively make the model piece-wise linear) do not generate asymmetric anything. But the issue is not in the solution method: nonlinear solutions of standard models also do not produce asymmetric responses in noticeable ways. Hence, although by experience we understand there are likely sizable asymmetries in macroeconomic and financial outcomes, we have neither extensively documented these nor understood what brings them about.
This research program, then, will consist of five distinct but related questions:
1. Are there asymmetries due to the state of the business cycle and the nature of the shock?
2. Do financial markets behave as if market participants perceive the world to be asymmetric?
3. Do policymakers behave asymmetrically and if so why?
4. To the extent that there are asymmetries, what brings them about?
5. What kinds of policies should we be thinking of in a world with asymmetries?
Max ERC Funding
1 276 640 €
Duration
Start date: 2017-03-01, End date: 2022-02-28
