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auc·tion | \ ˈȯk-shən 
\
\Definition of auction
(Entry 1 of 2)
1 : a sale of property to the highest bidder
2 : the act or process of bidding in some card games
auction
verbauctioned; auctioning\ ˈȯk-sh(ə-)niŋ \
\Definition of auction (Entry 2 of 2)
: to sell at auction
auctioned off his library
Examples of auction in a Sentence
Noun
She bought the desk at an auction.
He made several bids at the auction. Verb
They auctioned a similar desk last year.
The house was auctioned last week.
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Recent Examples on the Web: Noun The agency typically receives at least $125 million per quarter from the auction of cap-and-trade credits.
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Dustin Gardiner, SFChronicle.com, "California’s bullet train project faces unprecedented woes," 22 June 2020 The auction page for #AskChefsAnything is live for viewing now.
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Amanda Albee, Dallas News, "New ‘Ask Chefs Anything’ initiative to raise funds for the immigrant restaurant workforce," 19 June 2020 He is associated with — though not charged in — a criminal case that brought federal charges against six of his former underlings at eBay, the online auction house.
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Jamie L. Lareau, Detroit Free Press, "GM board member becoming familiar name for the wrong reasons," 18 June 2020 Botters can speed through these dungeons, gather rare resources and dump their wares onto the auction house, which artificially lowers their value.
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Cecilia D'anastasio, Wired, "Bot Mafias Have Wreaked Havoc in World of Warcraft Classic," 17 June 2020 The Siebels attended the 1981 auction at Christie’s with Thiebaud’s dealer, Allan Stone.
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Katya Kazakina, Fortune, "Rare ‘pinball machine’ painting by Wayne Thiebaud may fetch $25 million at Christie’s auction next month," 14 June 2020 In Virginia, a slave auction block was removed in Fredericksburg, and protesters in Portsmouth knocked the heads off the statues of four Confederates.
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Sarah Rankin David Crary, The Christian Science Monitor, "Why the fallen statues? Floyd protests prompt global removals.," 12 June 2020 The filming of each garden will be posted on Facebook Live, and there will also be an auction item with each garden.
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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, "Home and garden tours are still planned for 2020, some virtually, others with precautions," 11 June 2020 Pai's auction rules also shut SpaceX and other satellite operators out of applying for funding in the gigabit tier.
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Jon Brodkin, Ars Technica, "Ajit Pai caves to SpaceX but is still skeptical of Musk’s latency claims," 10 June 2020 Recent Examples on the Web: Verb On June 20, Loïc Gouzer launched Fair Warning, a members-only app that will auction a single work of art roughly every week beginning June 28.
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Kelly Crow, WSJ, "Former Christie’s Star Sees the Future of Art Sales in an App," 20 June 2020 Another example: Vote-Auction, a platform created by art duo Ubermorgen that claimed to allow Americans to auction off votes during the 2000 presidential election.
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Washington Post, "These artists make online disinformation into art. Or is it the other way around?," 18 June 2020 The research paper, published in April in the journal Ecological Applications, comes as the federal government plans to auction leases for oil exploration in the refuge this year for the first time.
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Alex Demarban, Anchorage Daily News, "Oil exploration could leave decades-long scarring in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska researchers report," 17 June 2020 Besides threatening to lock the rightful owners out of their data, the operators auction off the unencrypted data on Dark Web sites.
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Dan Goodin, Ars Technica, "Honda halts production at some plants after being hit by a cyberattack," 9 June 2020 Concierge Auctions and Allie Beth Allman & Associates will auction a turnkey unit at the Ritz-Carlton Residences of Dallas online this month.
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Dallas News, "Dallas Ritz-Carlton turnkey unit to auction online," 7 June 2020 Like the 12 surviving bottles of wine from the North Sea, they’ll likely be auctioned.
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Caroline Delbert, Popular Mechanics, "Divers Salvage 100-Year-Old Liquor from WWI Shipwreck," 7 Nov. 2019 The house at 2825 Saratoga Trail will be auctioned Jan. 8, for failure to pay principal and interest.
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Kelsey Hammon, The Denver Post, "Auction of convicted murderer Christopher Watts’ Frederick home rescheduled for next year," 16 Sep. 2019 Tribal Nations will get a chance to apply for the unassigned licenses; the remaining licenses will be auctioned off.
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Klint Finley, WIRED, "Schools and Phone Companies Face Off Over Wireless Spectrum," 25 June 2019
See MoreThese example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'auction.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
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More Definitions for auction
auction
nounEnglish Language Learners Definition of auction
(Entry 1 of 2)
: a public sale at which things are sold to the people who offer to pay the most
auction
verbEnglish Language Learners Definition of auction (Entry 2 of 2)
: to sell (something) at an auction
See the full definition for auction in the English Language Learners Dictionary
auction
nounauc·tion | \ ˈȯk-shən \
\Kids Definition of auction
(Entry 1 of 2)
: a public sale at which things are sold to those who offer to pay the most
auction
verbauctioned; auctioning
Kids Definition of auction (Entry 2 of 2)
: to sell at an auction
The art was auctioned today.
auction
nounauc·tion
Legal Definition of auction
: a public sale of property to the highest bidder — see also reserve
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Time Traveler for auction
The first known use of auction was in 1595
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