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Safe coin bias when the opponent chooses second

Question

Alice and Bob each choose the heads probability of their own coin, then both toss. If both show heads, Alice pays Bob $6; if both show tails, Alice pays Bob $4; if they differ, Bob pays Alice $5. Alice must announce her probability p1p_1 before Bob picks his p2p_2. The set of p1p_1 for which Bob's expected profit is at most 00 whatever p2p_2 he picks is an interval [a,b][a,b] with rational endpoints. Find b−ab-a.

Short answer

1/991/99. Bob's expected profit simplifies to (20p1−9)p2+(4−9p1)(20p_1-9)p_2+(4-9p_1), which is linear in p2p_2, so he picks p2=0p_2=0 or 11. Requiring both 4−9p1≤04-9p_1\le0 and 11p1−5≤011p_1-5\le0 gives p1∈[49,511]p_1\in\left[\tfrac49,\tfrac5{11}\right], of width 199\tfrac{1}{99}.

Adapted from QuantQuestions.io; question and answer rewritten by SelfMadeQuant.com.

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