For more than two decades, research on incentives and market equilibrium in sit- uations with asymmetric information has been a prolific part of economic theory. In 1996, the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel was awarded to James Mirrlees and William Vickrey for their fundamental contributions to the theory of incentives under asymmetric information, in particular its applications to the design of optimal income taxation and resource allocation through different types of auctions. The theory of markets with asymmetric information rests firmly on the work of three researchers: George Akerlof (University of California, Berkeley), Michael Spence (Stanford University) and Joseph Stiglitz (Columbia Uni- versity). Their pioneering contributions have given economists tools for analyzing a broad spectrum of issues. Applications extend from traditional agricultural markets to modern financial markets