A sale where the price is fixed by an auctioneer who invites bids, and awards the article being auctioned to the highest bidder. In an English auction the highest bid is publicly announced at each stage, and other parties are given a chance to make higher bids. In a sealed-bid auction the bids are not publicly announced: each bid is submitted sealed, and a time limit is set at which the auctioneer opens the bids and awards the article to the highest bidder, without further bids being invited. In a Dutch auction the auctioneer announces a decreasing series of prices, and the article is awarded to the first bidder. In any of these types of auction there may or may not be a reserve price, which is the lowest bid the seller will accept; this may or may not be published. The auctioneer normally charges the seller and possibly also the buyer a fee calculated as a percentage of the realized price. See also first-price auction; second-price auction.