Agents’ ability to manage information in centralized markets: Comparing two wholesale fish markets

In this paper, we perform an empirical investigation to detect if and how agents’ behavior changes with the amount of available information they have. To this aim, we use data from two wholesale fish markets of different thicknesses. We tackle the issue by investigating features such as the dynamics of the structure of attendance in auctions, the varieties of fish presentations during the seller’s turn and the presence of long-term relationships between buyers and sellers. We perform the investigation in this way instead of focusing on the dispersion and dynamics of prices to prevent unobserved quality differences of the traded fish varieties from biasing the results of the analysis. The results of our investigation are consistent with a situation in which the magnitude of phenomena like buyers’ loyalty to sellers and agents following rules of thumb increases with the market thickness.

Research highlights► We investigate if the amount of available information affects buyers’ behavior. ► To this aim, we use data from two wholesale fish markets of different thicknesses. ► Buyers’ loyalty to sellers increases in magnitude with the market thickness. ► The same happens to the use of rules of thumb. ► The structure of attendance and the varieties presentations have been also analyzed.