Last week, I was interested to listen to a quick interview of East Coast academics discussing reverse auction theory/technology to solve the credit crisis by procurement of toxic mortgages. Spend Matters has been involved in this topic for a couple weeks, as Jason Busch and Sam Kinney have had discussions with the Treasury Dept about strategies utilizing reverse auction technology to save the world. Sam is a founder of Freemarkets and has a fascinating blog named, Up the Economy, which I recommend. His writings have helped me understand some issues that, I admit, did not all sink in. As an accomplished economist, his opinions have carried weight with the Federal government.

However, listen to the NPR interview for yourself. It is a little fluffy, but the theorists bring up some challenging issues with the concept of auctioning this paper. It actually sounds pretty formidable to overcome despite the best intentions. I will be curious to see if some of these challenges are effectively addressed.