Size-discovery trade mechanisms allow large quantities of an asset to be exchanged at a price that does not respond to price pressure. Primary examples include "workup" in Treasury markets, "matching sessions" in corporate bond and CDS markets, and block-trading "dark pools" in equity markets....

Recent scandals over the manipulation of LIBOR, foreign exchange benchmarks, and other financial benchmarks have spurred policy discussions over their appropriate design. We characterize the optimal fixing of a benchmark as an estimator of a market value or reference rate. The fixing data are...

We explain how the common practice of size-discovery trade detracts from overallfinancial market efficiency. At each of a series of size-discovery sessions, traders report theirdesired trades, generating allocations of the asset and cash that rely on the most recent exchangeprice. Traders can...

We compute optimal mechanism designs for each of a sequence of size-discovery sessions, at which traders submit reports of their excess inventories of an asset to a session operator, which allocates transfers of cash and the asset. The mechanism design induces truthful reports of desired trades...