E-Z money at Intrade

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

These are two different available contracts:

The Democrats to control the Senate after 2010 Congressional Elections - 54.5

Republicans to hold 50 or more Senate seats after 2010 mid-term elections - 28.2

http://www.intrade.com/

Seems like a highly exploitable spread between those two proposition bets!

But maybe not as sweet as it first appears. (Does Intrade know that the sitting VP is President of the Senate?)

You could hedge your bets and still lose both if the Senate ends up 50-50. If "Republicans hold (exactly) 50... seats" then "Democrats... control the Senate."

(Of course, one could argue that "Democrats to control the Senate" is a long-shot in every scenario, depending on how one defines "control.")

[deaniac21]

1. Then you have to take into account:

Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

2. Good point, but the timing is key.

I'd have to look at the specific contract to see what "after the election" means, since no organizational votes would happen until January 2011.

[DefenseLawyer]

3. Democrats don't really control the Senate now.

That should be obvious to everyone.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

4. ...