INTRADE market update: Obama up to 48, Clinton 53, more accurate than any poll

[synesthesia]

http://www.intrade.com/

Obama was at his highest at 72 the day of New Hampshire (with the big poll lead)

He fell to 22 after losing the Nevada Cauc., and stayed pretty low for awhile

It seemed to start to trickle upwards after the Kennedy endorsements (market watchers look for clues someone is supported by the establishment). In the past week, for whatever reason, he's gained like 12.

The people putting money on this thing are basically declaring it a dead heat at this point.

Tomorrow should be very very interesting. When have we had this type of primary intrigue :).

On the other side, intrade has McCain at 90+, Romney at 7, so it's over.

I should mention, John Kerry went up to like 90 once the exit polls were leaked in 2004, but that's really only because they didnt anticipate voter fraud.

[joshcryer]

1. Seems like you did a double post.

Otherwise, cool. :D

[Unsane]

2. GOBAMA

[synesthesia]

3. *

it appears the people putting money on things think there's a 70% chance of a recession

not so good

[joshcryer]

4. That was actually the first thing I noticed. Damn.

[KaryninMiami]

5. Interesting. But-- FYI- it's election fraud- not voter fraud that they had not expected.

Voters tried very hard to vote- but the machines were rigged (or in some cases there weren't enough of them, or their names had been removed from the voting rosters, etc.). Voters rarely commit voter fraud- (except for Ann Coulter). Electronic voting machines, however, are another story.

[Freddie Stubbs]

6. How is this more accurate than any poll?

:shrug:

[Teaser]

7. It's not...

it just measures conventional wisdom at any given moment.

[synesthesia]

8. *

Well, polls for any one state don't really mean that much. Or even national, because momentum and news events and things influence them too much.

But a market for futures, people have tons of money on the line, and they try to account for every future variable; therefor, it's a pretty good indicator of how people who have invested a lot of objective, non partisan, research, into the matter, feel things are going.

The fact it's 50/50 this late in the game is pretty big, in that, money people actually think there's an even odd that Obama can pull this entire thing off.

[synesthesia]

9. *

A good example of polls vs future markets.

Even when Rudy had a huge national lead, he never soared TOO high in the markets, because people accounted for the fact that future events might limit him.

Just an example.

[AndyTiedye]

10. InTraders Slightly Favor McCain to Win the General Election Now

2008.PRES.CLINTON(H) Hillary Clinton to win 2008 US Presidential Election Trade 33.0 35.9 33.2 171316 -2.2
2008.PRES.McCAIN John McCain to win 2008 US Presidential Election Trade 33.8 36.0 36.0 114479 +0.2
2008.PRES.OBAMA Barack Obama to win 2008 US Presidential Election Trade 27.0 27.9 28.2 75736 +4.2