Interesting shill-bidding incident at REA

[DRILLINDK]

Anyone see the "American Greed" series on MSNBC about shill bidding between Sotheby's and Christie's auction houses?

[gingi79]

www.gamewornauctions.net had this issue. It was a giant hullabaloo and people who did it were condoned by the auction house. Apparently, the auction house knew and felt as long as they paid the fees, they were just as entitled to "re-win" their item as the next person. The proverbial crap hit the fan when the reason behind it came out (Seller was not impressed with the bids and felt the shirt was much more valuable. He was willing to pay the associated fees to keep it rather than get a less than acceptable price)

Coincidentally, people who stood up and said it was wrong......were lynched and banned from the site.

Thankfully, GUU isn't run like that

[kingjammy24]

at some auction houses, sometimes i'd see garbage items fetch unusually high prices and i'd wonder who possessed such a combination of wealth and ignorance. now i know that in many cases it may just have been the owner shilling up the bids, under the approving eye of the auction house.

rudy.