Choosing a consultant in a dynamic investment problem

Abstract

Consider a dynamic decision-making scenario where at every stage the investor has to choose between investing in one of two projects or gathering more information. At each stage, the investor may seek counsel from one of several consultants, who, for a fixed cost, provide partial information about the realized state. We explore the optimal strategy and its dependence on the belief and the consultation cost. Our analysis reveals that if one of the consultants discloses the state with a nonzero probability, this consultant will be used in any optimal strategy, provided the consultation cost is sufficiently small.