LLM eBay: A Simple and Truthful Marketplace for Fine-Tuned LLMs Trading

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Key findings

• On real LoRA checkpoints across two base models and three buyer tasks, LLM eBay reduces measured convergence steps by 8.5% vs. retrieval over self-reported style (95% CI [1.0%, 15.9%]).
• In model-based simulations, style-claim error falls 96.5% (from 0.424 to 0.015) and 96.3% of Oracle welfare is recovered.
• It saves 72.4% of the cost of fine-tuning from the base model and keeps all providers profitable in the default setting.

📄 Abstract

Personalized fine-tuning of Large Language Models (LLMs) enhances user experience but incurs substantial computational costs. Recent studies show that initializing training from a style-similar fine-tuned model reduces adaptation overhead, turning such checkpoints into reusable, tradable assets. A marketplace for these checkpoints, however, faces information asymmetry: sellers may misreport a checkpoint's style, while buyers cannot verify its usefulness before purchase, which invites adverse selection. We introduce LLM eBay, a simple single-round marketplace for trading fine-tuned LLMs. Sellers are paid per purchase at a posted price, and a truncated quadratic proper scoring rule adjusts each payment according to how well the seller's style report agrees with a style signal that the platform measures by generating text on hidden prompts. We show that the score elicits the verifier's expected signal, characterize exactly when truthful reporting is a seller best response under per-purchase demand, and bound the downside risk from noisy verification. In an end-to-end study with real LoRA checkpoints on two base models and three buyer tasks, LLM eBay reduces measured convergence steps by 8.5\% relative to retrieval over self-reported style (95\% CI [1.0\%, 15.9\%]). In model-based market simulations built on a measured style-to-cost relationship, it cuts style-claim error by 96.5\% (from 0.424 to 0.015), recovers 96.3\% of Oracle welfare, saves 72.4\% of the cost of fine-tuning from the base model, and keeps all providers profitable in the default setting.