RSS 2.0 FeedIntrade — Make Money On Barr’08
by Brad WarbianyLast night, I posted about the wild swings seen on the Intrade prediction market for President; wilder than anything I saw in ’04. I wanted to see how a true “long shot” was looking, so I started looking up contracts on Barr.
Barr has several contracts based on his percentage in the popular vote, and a contract on whether or not he will receive any electoral votes. There may be options to take advantage of these contracts.
The contract trading whether he will receive >2% of the popular vote is trading at about 19, which mathematically makes it about a 4:1 bet if you want to hold it until election day. The contract trading whether he will receive >3% of the popular vote is currently trading at 4. Mathematically, that’s a 24:1 bet.
I’m actually considering getting on there and laying $100 on each contract, buying 5 shares of the 2% and 25 shares of the 3% contract. Assuming that Barr makes it above 2% but not 3%, I’d walk away with $500 for a $300 profit. If he were to pass 3%, I’d walk away with $3000 for a $2800 profit.
Given that this election seems to be running away from McCain, I think there’s a good chance that the “protest vote” will be out in more force than usual. Granted, the Libertarian party candidate hasn’t earned over 1% of the popular vote nationwide in recent history, but there’s a first time for everything, right?
How might one purchase said futures contract? My bank won’t permit funds transfers of this kind. (It’s probably illegal under the Online Gambling Ban.)
Comment by thomasblair — October 15, 2008 @ 9:51 amI found this:
Information on funds transfer
You can use a credit card if no other options are available. I think some of my online poker friends have used FirePay successfully with a bank account.
Of course, I wouldn’t want to counsel you to do anything illegal ;-)
Comment by Brad Warbiany — October 15, 2008 @ 10:53 am