Ching-I Huang

Estimating demand for cellular phone service under nonlinear pricing

Cellular phone carriers typically offer complicated nonlinear tariffs. Consumers make a discrete choice among several rate plans. Each plan has a nonlinear price schedule, and price is usually lower for in-network calls. I present an empirical framework to estimate demand under such nonlinear pricing schemes by using parsimonious carrier-level data and apply the estimation method to analyze the market in Taiwan. I evaluate the impacts of termination-based pricing schemes on the market structure by counterfactual simulations. There is no evidence showing that the network effect resulting from termination-based pricing has significant effects on market structure.

A dynamic model of auctions with buy-it-now: theory and evidence

In the ascending‐price auctions with Yahoo!‐type buy‐it‐now (BIN), we characterize and derive the closed‐form solution for the optimal bidding strategy of the bidders and the optimal BIN price of the seller when they are both risk‐averse. The seller is shown to be strictly better off with the BIN option, while the bidders are better off only when their valuation is high enough. The theory also implies that the expected transaction price is higher in an auction with an optimal BIN price than one without a BIN option. This prediction is confirmed by our data collected from Taiwans Yahoo! auctions.

Buyer behavior under the Best Offer mechanism: A theoretical model and empirical evidence from eBay Motors

We use data from eBay Best Offer listings to analyze haggling over prices in transactions with one seller and a series of potential buyers for a limited-supply product. We characterize this transaction mechanism as a sequential-move game to investigate buyer behavior. Our model suggests that a buyers offer price increases in relations to the number of buyers who have previously made an offer on the item and the Buy-It-Now price chosen by the seller. On the other hand, the offer price decreases for items which have been listed on eBay for a longer period of time. We empirically test our theoretical predictions using data on the sales of Toyota Camry cars on eBay Motors. The empirical evidence is consistent with our model.

Are eBay Auctions Efficient? Sequential Ascending Auctions with New Buyer Entries

I model the environment of Internet auction sites, such as eBay, as sequential ascending auctions. New buyers may enter the auction site after some of the auctions have completed and only bid for the remaining auctions. I characterize a perfect Bayesian equilibrium in the dynamic game. Because incumbent buyers have revealed their own valuations in earlier auctions while new entrants do not, information is asymmetric among buyers during the bidding process. Consequently, their bidding strategies are different. A lower-valuation buyer may win an auction while a higher-valuation buyer restrains from bidding higher, resulting an inefficient allocation. In general, the expected transaction prices would increase over time. Comparing to selling the multiple items in a single-round simultaneous auction, sellers can exploit the information asymmetry in sequential auctions to obtain a higher revenue.

The Effect of Information Disclosure on Product Demand: Evidence from Yahoo! Auctions Taiwan

We study the effect of information disclosure in resolving adverse selection by estimating the demand for a specific type of T-shirt sold on the Yahoo! Auctions platform. To reduce information asymmetry in Internet transactions, sellers usually voluntarily disclose product information by providing photos on the website. The disclosed information in this market can be naturally separated into high and low quality levels. Providing high-quality information which accurately reflects product characteristics not only increases consumer demand, but also has a positive marginal effect for adding more high-quality information. On the contrary, increasing the amount of low-quality information has almost no effect on demand.

First Offers on Ebay Motors

We empirically investigate the factors which influence a buyer’s behavior in making an offer to purchase a car listed on eBay Motors using the “Best Offer” option. Our results indicate that a buyer’s first offer is affected by observed information, including the number of buyers making an offer for the same item and the length of time since the start of the listing.

Bidding Strategies in Internet Parallel Auctions

This paper proposes a simple model for multiple second-price auctions which run parallel to each other, in the sense that though they might not begin or end at the same time, they have certain periods of overlap. We characterize the equilibrium bidding strategy of the buyers and the equilibrium price of each auction. Last-minute bids arise naturally in the equilibrium. We show that, except for the last auction, the maximum price a buyer is willing to pay is less than his valuation, and that the ex ante expected transaction prices are identical for all auctions. A simple empirical test is also performed to verify the theoretical implication of the model.