mlsanityData to 14 Oct 2026

Can LLM Agents Price Competitively? A Dynamic Multi-Attribute Auction Benchmark for Agentic Commerce

arXiv 2608.00102 ↗First posted 30 Jul 2026cs.AI cs.MAcited by 0

On the map: LLM agents and tool use → Financial trading and forecasting agents

Abstract (arXiv)

Agentic commerce is moving from concept to deployed infrastructure: payment networks, retailers, and AI platforms are setting the stage for agents to transact on behalf of merchants and consumers. Yet whether the LLMs behind these agents can price competently in real markets, where customer preferences are hidden, competitors adapt in real time, and demand can shift without warning, has not been systematically tested. We introduce Bazaar, a dynamic sealed-bid benchmark for multi-attribute auction under these conditions. Despite its dynamics, the benchmark is grounded in closed-form customer utilities, enabling exact evaluation. Across 11 frontier LLMs from four providers, the leading agents on customer acquisition (e.g. Gemini 3.1 Pro) are often not the leading agents on profit (e.g. Opus 4.6). The ranking shifts again under demand shocks: agents that learned fastest pre-shock are typically the slowest to revise their beliefs afterwards, while Gemini 3.1 Pro recovers fastest despite not leading on profit. However, even the strongest agent captures less than a third of hindsight-optimal profit, suggesting current LLMs are progressing in agentic commerce but leave substantial headroom.

Key facts. No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026). Placed in Financial trading and forecasting agents, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use. Builds on 13 of its 48 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 30 Jul 2026.

Builds on

13 of 48 references.

Closest ancestors · 2

Same direction, newest first

  1. 2025InfoBid: A Simulation Framework for Studying Information Disclosure in Auctions with Large Language Model-based Agents26 Mar
  2. 2023Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is: Evaluating Strategic Planning and Execution of LLM Agents in an Auction Arena9 Oct

Other references · 11

  1. 2022WebShop: Towards Scalable Real-World Web Interaction with Grounded Language Agentscited by 1,251
  2. 2018Decoupling Strategy and Generation in Negotiation Dialoguescited by 162
  3. 2024How Well Can LLMs Negotiate? NegotiationArena Platform and Analysiscited by 100
  4. 2024Game-theoretic LLM: Agent Workflow for Negotiation Gamescited by 56
  5. 2024NegotiationToM: A Benchmark for Stress-testing Machine Theory of Mind on Negotiation Surroundingcited by 51
  6. 2024Measuring Bargaining Abilities of LLMs: A Benchmark and A Buyer-Enhancement Methodcited by 48
  7. 2024eCeLLM: Generalizing Large Language Models for E-commerce from Large-scale, High-quality Instruction Datacited by 46
  8. 2025MAGPIE: A benchmark for Multi-AGent contextual PrIvacy Evaluationcited by 29
  9. 2024GLEE: A Unified Framework and Benchmark for Language-based Economic Environmentscited by 20
  10. 2025LLM Bidders Preserve the Mechanism-Level Orderings of Human Bidderscited by 10
  11. 2025Evaluating Multi-Turn Bargain Skills in LLM-Based Seller Agentcited by 4

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  3. 2025HARBOR: Exploring Persona Dynamics in Multi-Agent Competition
  4. 2026Competitive Market Behavior of LLMs
  5. 2026Business Arena: Benchmarking LLM Agents in a Realistic Marketplace
  6. 2026Strategic Exploitation in LLM Agent Markets: A Simulation Framework for E-Commerce Trust
  7. 2026Competing at Every Price Point with Agentic Evolution over a Menu of LLMs
  8. 2026AgenticPay: A Multi-Agent LLM Negotiation System for Buyer-Seller Transactions