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We study a dynamic contracting problem with multiple agents and limited commitment. A principal seeks to screen efficient agents using one-period contracts, but is tempted to revise contract terms upon knowing an agent's type. Alterations…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2025-03-24 Mehmet Ekmekci , Lucas Maestri , Dong Wei

A principal contracts with an agent who sequentially searches over projects to generate a prize. The principal initially knows only one of the agent's available projects and evaluates a contract by its worst-case performance. We…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2025-09-17 Théo Durandard , Udayan Vaidya , Boli Xu

A principal wishes to transact business with a multidimensional distribution of agents whose preferences are known only in the aggregate. Assuming a twist (= generalized Spence-Mirrlees single-crossing) hypothesis and that agents can choose…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2009-12-17 Alessio Figalli , Young-Heon Kim , Robert J. McCann

In a decision-making scenario, a principal could use conditional predictions from an expert agent to inform their choice. However, this approach would introduce a fundamental conflict of interest. An agent optimizing for predictive accuracy…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-12-31 Rubi Hudson

The agency problem emerges in today's large scale machine learning tasks, where the learners are unable to direct content creation or enforce data collection. In this work, we propose a theoretical framework for aligning economic interests…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-07-03 Jibang Wu , Siyu Chen , Mengdi Wang , Huazheng Wang , Haifeng Xu

This paper examines the optimal contracts in a two-dimensional screening model where one dimension(group identity) is verifiable by agents but not falsifiable. A principal offers contracts to agents who differ in cost types and group…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2026-04-02 Charles Po-Cheng Huang

We analyze the optimal delegation problem between a principal and an agent, assuming that the latter has state-independent preferences. We demonstrate that if the principal is more risk-averse than the agent toward non-status quo options,…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2024-09-19 Xiaoxiao Hu , Haoran Lei

This work considers a repeated principal-agent bandit game, where the principal can only interact with her environment through the agent. The principal and the agent have misaligned objectives and the choice of action is only left to the…

This paper studies a continuous-time market {under stochastic environment} where an agent, having specified an investment horizon and a target terminal mean return, seeks to minimize the variance of the return with multiple stocks and a…

Portfolio Management · Quantitative Finance 2013-02-28 Wan-Kai Pang , Yuan-Hua Ni , Xun Li , Ka-Fai Cedric Yiu

We study a robust contract design problem with deferred inspection, in which a principal allocates a scarce resource to an agent, observes the agent's realized outcome ex post at negligible cost, and conditions transfers on this information…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2026-01-12 Halil I. Bayrak , Martin Bichler

We introduce a novel model of contracts with combinatorial actions that accounts for sequential and adaptive agent behavior. As in the standard model, a principal delegates the execution of a costly project to an agent. There are $n$…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2025-04-22 Tomer Ezra , Michal Feldman , Maya Schlesinger

We present an algorithm to approximate the solutions to variational problems where set of admissible functions consists of convex functions. The main motivator behind this numerical method is estimating solutions to Adverse Selection…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2008-03-07 Ivar Ekeland , Santiago Moreno

We investigate constrained optimal control problems for linear stochastic dynamical systems evolving in discrete time. We consider minimization of an expected value cost over a finite horizon. Hard constraints are introduced first, and then…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2011-07-07 Eugenio Cinquemani , Mayank Agarwal , Debasish Chatterjee , John Lygeros

We study how to allocate resources to participants who can strategically misrepresent their deservingness at a cost. A principal assigns item(s) (or money) among multiple agents on the basis of their costly signals. Each agent's signal…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2026-03-05 Yingkai Li , Xiaoyun Qiu

Linear contracts are ubiquitous in practice, yet optimal contract theory often prescribes complex, nonlinear structures. We provide a distributional robustness justification for linear contracts. We study a principal-agent problem where the…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2026-04-28 Shiliang Zuo

A principal who values an object allocates it to one or more agents. Agents learn private information (signals) from an information designer about the allocation payoff to the principal. Monetary transfer is not available but the principal…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2022-10-31 Yi-Chun Chen , Gaoji Hu , Xiangqian Yang

We consider the mechanism design problem of a principal allocating a single good to one of several agents without monetary transfers. Each agent desires the good and uses it to create value for the principal. We designate this value as the…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2024-06-26 Halil İbrahim Bayrak , Çağıl Koçyiğit , Daniel Kuhn , Mustafa Çelebi Pınar

We study a continuous time contracting model in which a principal hires a risk averse agent to manage a project over a finite horizon and provides sequential payments whose timing is endogenously determined. The resulting nonzero-sum…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2025-12-01 Guillermo Alonso Alvarez , Ibrahim Ekren , Liwei Huang

We consider the problem of controlling an unknown linear dynamical system in the presence of (nonstochastic) adversarial perturbations and adversarial convex loss functions. In contrast to classical control, the a priori determination of an…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-01-22 Elad Hazan , Sham M. Kakade , Karan Singh

This research considers the ranking and selection with input uncertainty. The objective is to maximize the posterior probability of correctly selecting the best alternative under a fixed simulation budget, where each alternative is measured…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2023-05-15 Hui Xiao , Zhihong Wei