5 ms·

I was looking at the Intrade prediction market a couple of days ago.. I think they got everything correct too.

by damian2000 14y ago

arn 14y ago
Presumably Silver's projection is "priced in" to Intrade.
usaar333 14y ago
Nope. Florida was predicted as going for Romney up until results starting coming in: http://www.intrade.com/v4/markets/contract/?contractId=745736 http://www.intrade.com/v4/markets/contract/?contractId=74573...
nikcub 14y ago
Most markets got the winner right, which isn't a surprise, but they didn't get the margin right. I found Obama to win 310-330 electoral college votes at $8 on Betfair yesterday (and I put it on, and it looks like I won). The betting markets did believe that Obama would win, but there was a lot of money on the race being closer and not as wide as Silver was predicting. This is probably because the media narrative of the past two weeks was that the race is close. There is a rumor that some Republican donors were shortening the odds in the margin betting in order to perpetuate the line that the race is closer. I don't know how true that is, but it would be possible to move the market with a few large bets.
- the_cat_kittles 14y ago
  Where did you hear that rumor? I have all but concluded that on my own based on the bizarrely low prices on obama shares on intrade over the past week. It would be very interesting to hear something more than speculation.
  - nikcub 14y ago
    I was hanging out and talking to other people who are interested in betting markets online, we were just speculating. We mostly talk about sports betting but the election was such a big topic in betting that you couldn't avoid it and I ended up getting sucked into it. I should have looked into it further, this has since been posted: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4756229 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4756229 I don't have much experience with Intrade, but there must be a way to dump data from the site and investigate the orders and buys being made. As that post says, putting down $1M to keep the odds more in line with a narrative of the contest being close is small change in the context of political spending today. I had two people tell me that rumor. One heard it via friends on Wall St and the other read it in another forum, IIRC. There must be something to explain the spread between Intrade and Betfair, that the market was being manipulated by those with a vested interest makes sense.

I was looking at the Intrade prediction market a couple of days ago.. I think they got everything correct too.

arn 14y ago

Presumably Silver's projection is "priced in" to Intrade.

Nope. Florida was predicted as going for Romney up until results starting coming in: http://www.intrade.com/v4/markets/contract/?contractId=745736 http://www.intrade.com/v4/markets/contract/?contractId=74573...

nikcub 14y ago

Most markets got the winner right, which isn't a surprise, but they didn't get the margin right. I found Obama to win 310-330 electoral college votes at $8 on Betfair yesterday (and I put it on, and it looks like I won). The betting markets did believe that Obama would win, but there was a lot of money on the race being closer and not as wide as Silver was predicting. This is probably because the media narrative of the past two weeks was that the race is close. There is a rumor that some Republican donors were shortening the odds in the margin betting in order to perpetuate the line that the race is closer. I don't know how true that is, but it would be possible to move the market with a few large bets.

the_cat_kittles 14y ago
Where did you hear that rumor? I have all but concluded that on my own based on the bizarrely low prices on obama shares on intrade over the past week. It would be very interesting to hear something more than speculation.
- nikcub 14y ago
  I was hanging out and talking to other people who are interested in betting markets online, we were just speculating. We mostly talk about sports betting but the election was such a big topic in betting that you couldn't avoid it and I ended up getting sucked into it. I should have looked into it further, this has since been posted: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4756229 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4756229 I don't have much experience with Intrade, but there must be a way to dump data from the site and investigate the orders and buys being made. As that post says, putting down $1M to keep the odds more in line with a narrative of the contest being close is small change in the context of political spending today. I had two people tell me that rumor. One heard it via friends on Wall St and the other read it in another forum, IIRC. There must be something to explain the spread between Intrade and Betfair, that the market was being manipulated by those with a vested interest makes sense.