The Staking Board, Auctions: Debate

[cambridgealex]

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.

[SuuPRlim]

One point I will make, not that I don't think a site that hosts these auctions would be a good idea (if anyone has had it ) but staking boards are driven by BUYERS, not SELLERS, if there isn't enough people buying then no matter how good an offers are for sale a staking board will not work.

I sell action for lots of things lots of times and I have regular buyers, I look after them in many ways. Seems the auctions don't offer much for the prolific buyers like Flushy/Rupert etc who buy regularly and buy big.

[cambridgealex]

I don't see any reason why any one buyer or group of buyers should get preferential treatment or be "looked after" in any way on a public staking board.

[Rupert]

Any person selling action obviously wants to deal with as few people as possible. Transaction/administration costs are non-trivial

[cambridgealex]

Any person selling action obviously wants to deal with as few people as possible. Transaction/administration costs are non-trivial

Agree

[SuuPRlim]

I don't see any reason why any one buyer or group of buyers should get preferential treatment or be "looked after" in any way on a public staking board.

not preferential, but certain people spend a lot more $'s buying than others, which ensures the liquidity of the board, without these people the board wouldn't run so a system which makes life difficult for them is negative for the whole board, including the buyers who spend less $, because without the liquidity the opportunity to buy wouldn't be there.

[DMorgan]

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.

Actually if you look at the economic theory - draining every cent is exactly what auctions are about. They allow the price to increase until an equilibrium price is reached. This by definition is the highest possible price at which the product will sell out. Therefore it stands to reason that big buyers like Flushy and Rupert do not like auctions. If every thread became an auction and every buyer was happy to use the auction format, prices can only increase. Trying to dress it up as anything else is very misleading imo.

Unfortunately for sellers this concept assumes that buyers are indifferent between buying in an auction format and buying in the standard 'given price' format. If buyers were indifferent between the two formats then it would always be correct for the seller to run an auction format and get the highest possible price. Until recently the auction format hasn't been getting a ton of love so I've steered clear of it but people seem to be slowly warming to the idea so I think the number of auctions will pick up.

As for the problem of good value stuff selling out quickly - thats more of a problem for the seller than the buyers. While its all very nice to have packages snap sell out, to me as an economist that means I've done myself out of a lot of value by pricing myself too low. I've been using the old 'trial and error' method to find my equilibrium prices rather than auctions because I think there is more value in the 'given price' format than the auction format at the present time. Sometimes this will lead to markups being too low and snap selling out (SCOOP & Marbella), sometimes I get them just about right and it sells out steadily (ala 10k heads up) and sometimes its a little high and the action might not shift (ala main event, although this very much remains to be seen). I choose not to take market movements personally and I think having a thick skin is the way to go if you're going to push the boundaries and really try to maximise your EV.

[pleno1]

Amazingly good post dan

[FUN4FRASER]

Amazingly good post dan

+ 1  Well Played

[Dubai]

Dan just run an auction and if you are struggling for bids its pretty easy- u suddenly have an anonymous bidder by pm, Alan buys 5% via facebook, John sent u a 3%  twitter bid or my personal favourite is to leave it late and low and behold a good pal of yours without 300 bids swoops in and sends the price through the roof

[FUN4FRASER]

Moderator ..take Dans post & onward to a new thread ?  so as not take over Skols

[luckyblind]

Hi James, I would like to pay by bank xfer please. Can you pm me details and current rate. Gl in vegas!

[The Camel]

Dan just run an auction and if you are struggling for bids its pretty easy- u suddenly have an anonymous bidder by pm, Alan buys 5% via facebook, John sent u a 3%  twitter bid or my personal favourite is to leave it late and low and behold a good pal of yours without 300 bids swoops in and sends the price through the roof

This is harsh.

But gold.

[cambridgealex]

Dan just run an auction and if you are struggling for bids its pretty easy- u suddenly have an anonymous bidder by pm, Alan buys 5% via facebook, John sent u a 3%  twitter bid or my personal favourite is to leave it late and low and behold a good pal of yours without 300 bids swoops in and sends the price through the roof

Sounds like you're accusing one of me, James or Karl of something Dave? How else are people without blonde accounts or <300 posts supposed to bid on auctions?

Nobody can change the price without paying for it anyway, so if me and a mate were to collude and buy half the action at 1.x to send the price through the roof, we'd still have to pay the higher price.

[Dubai]

Don't get offended its tongue in cheek- I'd already told keys what I thought and from pms ive been getting I'm obviously not in the minority

I actually said in my pms- they probably are just naive to what they are doing and completely innocent as they all are trustworthy but it sets a ridiculous precedent to allow bids from anonymous people, people sending pms/Facebook/twitter/the milkman etc. I'm sure I don't need to explain how you can manipulate a price without having to pay like you suggested.

Slippery slope if forum goes that route.