Morality, legality and auction collusion

Several years ago an auctioneer and attorney who writes a regular column for Antique Week newspaper wrote a column on this subject. Wish I still had a copy. It was a followup to columns written about "shill bidders" at live auctions. Shill bidding can cost an auctioneer his license, as well as other penalties. The gist of this article was that collusion by bidders at an auction is also illegal. I am sure the author referenced appropriate material but I don't remember the details.

 

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The text of the act makes it explicit that it applies to individuals. Some of the posts here have referred to its actual application to individuals. You can find plenty more examples, including individuals being imprisoned. You can't get clearer than that. I understand that you and @TIF have a different view of the reasonableness of discussing bids in advance, and I respect that. Reasonable people can differ. But I think some questions are clear-cut.

On the question of terms and conditions, I would not treat an auction house in Somalia as equal to one in the US, even if their terms and conditions were identical. I take a lot of comfort from the culture and laws of the US. 'Entitlement' wasn't the right word to use, but we rely on reasonable expectations as well as the letter of contracts. I don't look at the small print on most online terms and conditions, for example, and no one else does either (one mischievous firm included a clause selling soul to devil and no one noticed). We rely on consumer protection law and a culture that enforces certain norms. I think you and I just differ in our understanding of those norms.

 

Man, this thread has sucked the fun out of auctions for me. I'm done with this discussion. Best of luck to all of you.

 

Interest, thanks, but I would think that immorality usually precedes legality.
Bill

 

The stepping away from a lot or lots in a coin auction
has been going on for over a hundred years. In many
large auctions in the 50's and 60's (Farouk comes to mind)
dealers would meet before an auction and plan their bids
accordingly. John Pitman would stand near the front of an
auction and raise his bidders paddle and sternly look at the
audience daring them to raise his bid, hence the nickname
Statue of Liberty. Trying to prove any wrong doing between
bidders is almost impossible to prove.

 

Not necessarily. A lot of laws just establish common rules. There's no moral reason to choose to drive left or right, but there's a very good reason to pick one and make the other illegal. If you think bid rigging is moral, there's no reason not to make it legal and transparent, so everyone consigning to an auction expects buyers to collude.

 

Well, I'm with Oz here. This discussion has gotten far off into the weeds and I am leaving it. Bottom line I bid what I want to pay and just dont really care about anything else. If I am outbid, so be it. Thats just the way it is and there are always other coins. Now, as a seller, I suppose I would not like it if there were those who conspire to fix prices or otherwise reduce prices realized, but one cant really prove that, can they? And if I cant know about it or prove it, why should it bother me? There are so many things at auction in this day and age I dont think this happens often.

 

Interesting discussion guys. I think the point about the small size our field of interest (ancients) is a good one. Although auctions may technically be open for millions of people, the reality is that sometimes only a few people know to show up.

Also fascinating is to see the broad range of the commentators here. Two legal-begals and three philosophers? Cool stuff.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

Well, I was hoping for less competition in auctions. As crazy as this thread is/was/will be...........I believe it has partially accomplished that task.

So, in the detritus of this thread of doom I find...... A silver lining for me............

or as dear Brian below would say......always look on the bright side of life.

 

Yes, absolutely. As I mentioned early in this thread, I was in a price fixing lawsuit, and both anti-trust lawyers I was working with said virtually the same thing - "the tough part about proving price fixing is that nobody writes it down". Both were shocked in my case that the defendants *had* written it down, making our case far easier to prove.

 

"Both were shocked"....ah yes, the good ole days, back when people were accidentally stupid, and even attorneys could be shocked.

Today, there are attorneys, weeping and gnashing of teeth, because of................................................. Twitter.

I forget what shocked is like, and I am not an attorney.

 

Hah, good point! This was about 7-8 years ago, so not ancient. But given the way things have changed recently, "shock" is hard to claim with almost any legal situation.

 

Yes, but breaking common rules that have become societal norms and laws to gain a valued advantage, whether economic or of prestige, to me is immoral.