We consider the problem of mechanism design by a principal who has private information. We point out a simple condition under which the privacy of the principal's information is irrelevant in the sense that the mechanism implemented by the principal coincides with the mechanism that would be...

Zheng has proposed a seller-optimal auction for (asymmetric) independent-privatevalue environments where inter-bidder resale is possible. Zheng's construction requires novel conditions - Resale Monotonicity, Transitivity, and Invariance - on the bidders' value distribution profile. The only...

In standard auctions with symmetric, independent private value bidders resale creates a role for a speculator' a bidder who is commonly known to have no use value for the good on sale. For second-price and English auctions the efficient value-bidding equilibrium coexists with a continuum of...

In standard auctions with symmetric, independent private value bidders resale creates a role for a speculatora bidder who is commonly known to have no use value for the good on sale. For second-price and English auctions the efficient value-bidding equilibrium coexists with a continuum of...

Zheng has recently proposed a seller-optimal auction for (asymmetric) independent-private-value environments where inter-bidder resale is possible. Zheng's construction requires novel conditions on the bidders' value distribution pro le. We clarify the restrictions implied by these conditions....