Obviously!
Just to defend the concept a bit...
Some of the auctions so far:
Karl M - sold out at a reasonable 1.3 - good value for investors at that price imo.
Myself, my package sold out at 1.26, If I had been selling it without an auction, I'd have priced it higher than that tbh, as I think I'd be good value at 1.35 for that package. I also think I COULD have sold at 1.4 or 1.5 if I wanted to.
Similar for Keys, he's great value at 1.56 in the main, and COULD have sold at higher if he wanted.
Dan Morgan did not do an auction, he priced himself at 1.6 for the main, and over a week later, has sold less than half of what he needed to sell.
Auctions are about sellers NOT squeezing the market for every last cent. They are about letting the market decide what your worth. They let buyers decide what they are willing to pay, and never overcharge them, and they also never miss out because of being 5 seconds too late or whatever.
Two major problems with the staking board as I see it.
1) Sellers taking the piss - people thinking they can charge what they like and will get away with it. Sadly, they're right - 99% of threads sell out very quickly and people are charging higher and higher mark-ups because of this. This can only be bad for the market as a whole. You can argue that the market will correct itself - people won't sell if they charge too much / if you don't want it, don't buy it etc, but unfortunately people do still sell out (Dan's being the only exception I can think of) and buyers either get stung with bad value investments (drying up the market), or they miss out altogether because the price is too high.
2) The second major problem is that all the really good value investments get sold out straight away. Marc Wright is the best example. His staking threads are immense value and he can sell 5 figure stakes in under a minute, that isn't an exagerration! This is infuriating for buyers who'd happily pay extra mark-up to get a slice.
I believe the auction concept solves both of these problems.