Who to listen to: Exploiting information quality in a ZIP-agent market

Abstract

Market theory is often concerned only with centralised markets. In this paper, we consider a market that is distributed over a network, allowing us to characterise spatially (or temporally) segregated markets. The effect of this modification on the behaviour of a market populated by simple trading agents was examined. It was demonstrated that an agent's ability to identify the optimum market price is positively correlated with its network connectivity. A better connected agent receives more information and, as a result, is better able to judge the market state. The ZIP trading agent algorithm is modified in light of this result. Simulations reveal that trading agents which take account of the quality of the information that they receive are better able to identify the optimum price within a market. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2006.