Trading Agents

Automated trading in electronic markets is one of the most common and consequential applications of autonomous software agents. Design of effective trading strategies requires thorough understanding of how market mechanisms operate, and appreciation of strategic issues that commonly manifest in trading scenarios. Drawing on research in auction theory and artificial intelligence, this book presents core principles of strategic reasoning that apply to market situations. The author illustrates trading strategy choices through examples of concrete market environments, such as eBay, as well as abstract market models defined by configurations of auctions and traders. Techniques for addressing these choices constitute essential building blocks for the design of trading strategies for rich market applications. The lecture assumes no prior background in game theory or auction theory, or artificial intelligence. Table of Contents: Introduction / Example: Bidding on eBay / Auction Fundamentals / Continuous Double Auctions / Interdependent Markets / Conclusion

[1]  P. Cramton The FCC Spectrum Auctions: An Early Assessment , 1997 .

[2]  Michael P. Wellman,et al.  Flexible double auctions for electronic commerce: theory and implementation , 1998, Decis. Support Syst..

[3]  Rajarshi Das,et al.  High-performance bidding agents for the continuous double auction , 2001, EC '01.

[4]  Paul R. Milgrom,et al.  Auctions and Bidding: A Primer , 1989 .

[5]  Nicholas R. Jennings,et al.  Designing a successful trading agent:A fuzzy set approach , 2004, IEEE Transactions on Fuzzy Systems.

[6]  Robert J. Weber,et al.  An Example of a Multi-Object Auction Game , 1979 .

[7]  Paul R. Milgrom,et al.  A theory of auctions and competitive bidding , 1982 .

[8]  David A. McAllester,et al.  Decision-Theoretic Bidding Based on Learned Density Models in Simultaneous, Interacting Auctions , 2003, J. Artif. Intell. Res..

[9]  Michael Kearns,et al.  Reinforcement learning for optimized trade execution , 2006, ICML.

[10]  Michael P. Wellman,et al.  The 2001 trading agent competition , 2002, Electron. Mark..

[11]  Michael P. Wellman,et al.  A Parametrization of the Auction Design Space , 2001, Games Econ. Behav..

[12]  R. Myerson Incentive Compatibility and the Bargaining Problem , 1979 .

[13]  David C. Parkes,et al.  An options-based solution to the sequential auction problem , 2009, Artif. Intell..

[14]  Michael P. Wellman,et al.  Learning payoff functions in infinite games , 2005, Machine Learning.

[15]  Alexander Shapiro,et al.  The Sample Average Approximation Method for Stochastic Discrete Optimization , 2002, SIAM J. Optim..

[16]  Norman M. Sadeh,et al.  CMieux: adaptive strategies for competitive supply chain trading , 2006, ICEC '06.

[17]  R. Palmer,et al.  Characterizing effective trading strategies: Insights from a computerized double auction tournament , 1994 .

[18]  Steven Gjerstad,et al.  The Competitive Market Paradox , 2007 .

[19]  R. Rosenthal,et al.  Simultaneous Auctions with Synergies , 1996 .

[20]  Michael P. Wellman,et al.  Learning Improved Entertainment Trading Strategies for the TAC Travel Game , 2009, AMEC/TADA.

[21]  Dhananjay K. Gode,et al.  Allocative Efficiency of Markets with Zero-Intelligence Traders: Market as a Partial Substitute for Individual Rationality , 1993, Journal of Political Economy.

[22]  Michael P. Wellman,et al.  Walverine: a Walrasian trading agent , 2003, AAMAS '03.

[23]  Robert F. Easley,et al.  Jump Bidding Strategies in Internet Auctions , 2004, Manag. Sci..

[24]  Julian A. Padget,et al.  Agent-Mediated Electronic Commerce IV. Designing Mechanisms and Systems , 2002, Lecture Notes in Computer Science.

[25]  Sanmay Das A learning market-maker in the Glosten–Milgrom model , 2005 .

[26]  Yoav Shoham,et al.  Essentials of Game Theory: A Concise Multidisciplinary Introduction , 2008, Essentials of Game Theory: A Concise Multidisciplinary Introduction.

[27]  Nicholas R. Jennings,et al.  SouthamptonTAC: An adaptive autonomous trading agent , 2003, TOIT.

[28]  Scott E. Page,et al.  Interpreted and generated signals , 2009, J. Econ. Theory.

[29]  E. C. Capen,et al.  Competitive Bidding in High-Risk Situations , 1971 .

[30]  David Lucking-Reiley Vickrey Auctions in Practice: From Nineteenth-Century Philately to Twenty-First-Century E-Commerce , 2000 .

[31]  Shou-De Lin,et al.  A trading agent competition , 2000 .

[32]  Jason Miller,et al.  Controlling a supply chain agent using value-based decomposition , 2006, EC '06.

[33]  Paul R. Milgrom,et al.  Putting Auction Theory to Work: The Simultaneous Ascending Auction , 1999, Journal of Political Economy.

[34]  Katia Sycara,et al.  Agent Reasoning in Negotiation , 2010, Handbook of Group Decision and Negotiation.

[35]  Michael J. Fishman A theory of preemptive takeover bidding , 1988 .

[36]  Nikos I. Karacapilidis,et al.  Intelligent agents for an artificial market system , 2001, AGENTS '01.

[37]  Yoram Singer,et al.  An Efficient Boosting Algorithm for Combining Preferences by , 2013 .

[38]  Arie Buijs Statistiek om mee te werken , 2008 .

[39]  Daniel Lehmann,et al.  Combinatorial auctions with decreasing marginal utilities , 2001, EC '01.

[40]  Nicholas R. Jennings,et al.  Decision procedures for multiple auctions , 2002, AAMAS '02.

[41]  Mark M. Bykowsky,et al.  Mutually Destructive Bidding: The FCC Auction Design Problem , 2000 .

[42]  Tuomas Sandholm,et al.  Issues in Computational Vickrey Auctions , 2000, Int. J. Electron. Commer..

[43]  Nicholas R. Jennings,et al.  Guest Editors' Introduction: Agents and Markets , 2003, IEEE Intell. Syst..

[44]  Amy Greenwald,et al.  Bidding algorithms for simultaneous auctions , 2001, EC '01.

[45]  Raul Sidnei Wazlawick,et al.  Economic Theory, Anticipatory Systems and Artificial Adaptative Agents , 1999 .

[46]  J. Dickhaut,et al.  Price Formation in Double Auctions , 1998 .

[47]  Michael P. Wellman,et al.  Strategy and mechanism lessons from the first ad auctions trading agent competition , 2010, EC '10.

[48]  David C. Parkes,et al.  Models for Iterative Multiattribute Procurement Auctions , 2005, Manag. Sci..

[49]  Luis E. Ortiz,et al.  The Penn-Lehman Automated Trading Project , 2003, IEEE Intell. Syst..

[50]  Nicholas R. Jennings,et al.  Strategic bidding in continuous double auctions , 2008, Artif. Intell..

[51]  Jeffrey O. Kephart,et al.  Price and Niche Wars in a Free-Market Economy of Software Agents , 1997, Artificial Life.

[52]  Norman M. Sadeh,et al.  Pushing the Limits of Rational Agents: The Trading Agent Competition for Supply Chain Management , 2010, AI Mag..

[53]  Dave Cliff,et al.  ZIP60: Further Explorations in the Evolutionary Design of Trader Agents and Online Auction-Market Mechanisms , 2009, IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation.

[54]  G. Nemhauser,et al.  Integer Programming , 2020 .

[55]  L. Wintr Some Evidence on Late Bidding in Ebay Auctions , 2008 .

[56]  Victor Naroditskiy,et al.  Bidding Heuristics for Simultaneous Auctions: Lessons from TAC Travel , 2008, AMEC/TADA.

[57]  A. Roth,et al.  Last-Minute Bidding and the Rules for Ending Second-Price Auctions: Evidence from eBay and Amazon Auctions on the Internet , 2002 .

[58]  Michael P. Wellman,et al.  Forecasting market prices in a supply chain game , 2007, AAMAS '07.

[59]  Gerald Tesauro,et al.  Strategic sequential bidding in auctions using dynamic programming , 2002, AAMAS '02.

[60]  Brendan Kitts,et al.  Optimal Bidding on Keyword Auctions , 2004, Electron. Mark..

[61]  Robert B. Wilson On Equilibria of Bid-Ask Markets , 1987 .

[62]  Amy Greenwald,et al.  Bid determination in simultaneous actions an agent architecture , 2001, EC '01.

[63]  Michael P. Wellman,et al.  Market‐Based Allocation with Indivisible Bids , 2009 .

[64]  Victor Naroditskiy,et al.  RoxyBot-06: Stochastic Prediction and Optimization in TAC Travel , 2009, J. Artif. Intell. Res..

[65]  Tanmoy Chakraborty,et al.  Market making and mean reversion , 2011, EC '11.

[66]  Bart Selman,et al.  A principled study of the design tradeoffs for autonomous trading agents , 2003, AAMAS '03.

[67]  Simon Parsons,et al.  A novel method for automatic strategy acquisition in N-player non-zero-sum games , 2006, AAMAS '06.

[68]  Chris Preist,et al.  Commodity trading using an agent-based iterated double auction , 1999, AGENTS '99.

[69]  K. Borgwardt The Simplex Method , 1987 .