I understand youre a little slow so this difference might be lost on you. But I dont go into the NFL picks thread saying 'youre all idiots, this discussion is bad and the market is a joke, I could crush!" My point, which every single sharp will agree with me on, is that the nfl picks crowd doesnt respect the market enough. The NFL straights market is super sharp; probably the sharpest market in sports (at least top 3). And you have guys betting 20 dollar a game talking about their 18% ROI and wondering if theyre MAYBE running a little lucky. You are actually more on this guys side thinking you know more than a liquid, efficient, 6 figure max bet market.

I responded before even reading this. Youre proving my point...you think youre the only person who has thought about fading candidates convention bumps? Youre too new to this.

There's still EV in shorting convention bumps.

Politics is pretty much the easiest possible betting market to beat, because it only heats up every 4 years, and it always brings in a bunch of new money idiots who only consume media that reinforces their biases.

Plus the long-shot bias is full in effect, especially with the $850 limit on PredictIt. You could probably blindly buy every contract above 90 and be +EV there.

Yeah the most accurate model predicted a 30% chance for the eventual landslide (electorally) winner. Don't forget that this is also all with the benefit of perfect hindsight. There were plenty of other advanced models that didn't come nearly this close. This is not to mention that Silver's models bungled throughout the entire election with him giving hot takes such as Trump being 2% to win the election on sites like Reddit. This is not to mention all the missteps in the primaries, of which there were plenty.

Silver initially compared Trump to the next Michelle Bachmann, a flash in the pan who would make a splash early and then fade into irrelevancy. He made this error over and over throughout the election. I felt that his methodology was sufficiently bad that I actually contacted 538 to tell them they were misunderstanding the Trump phenomenon. This was all the way back in August of 2015, when Trump was still a huge underdog to even win the nom. He continued to make incorrect predictions throughout the election and then at the very end claimed this 29% midnight final to be his shining triumph.

This last election was no feather in the cap of predictive modeling.

Electoral landslide? We've had 58 presidential elections in this country. In electoral college terms, Trump won by the 46th largest margin. I know Trump likes to brag about how big his win was, but like a lot of other things, it isn't true.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...College_margin

I agree Silver was wrong to dismiss Trump as another Bachmann. (I think at one point he wrote Trump had a 0% chance to win). I certainly made the same mistake. After the 2012 election, though, it was really easy to fall into that frame -- the GOP base was really riled up and wanted someone more exciting than Romney. First Bachmann, then Perry, then Cain, then Gingrich, then Santorum. I mean, it was just a clown car of ridiculous candidates who all managed to surge to >30% in the national polls before the media spotlight made clear how flawed they were.

With that context, it was pretty easy to conceive of Jeb Bush as the Romney of 2016 and Trump as Bachmann 2.0.

I'm really curious how you managed to avoid that. Personally I broke out of that frame when Trump trash talked John McCain and his poll numbers didn't go down -- in the 2012 world, that would have been the end of the Trump phenomenon. I didn't know he would go all the way but at that point I realized I didn't understand what was going on.

What do we think the likelihood that political markets are distorted by campaigns? This could be everything from a campaign pumping up a candidates PredicIt/other price to get cheap press (or to drive turnout in a general) to staff hedging (they get a good job if their candidate wins, out of a job or relegated to a worse job if they lose). It's probably a low probability, but worth considering.

It's not remotely a landslide, Clinton won the popular vote by 2m+ if you redistribute 100k or so of those votes to swing states she wins an electoral college landslide

Trump basically ran super hot to run the table on swing states, if you re run the election with the same raw vote totals having Clinton as a 70/30 fav isn't that unreasonable. It was just an election where a 30-70 underdog won. The predictive modelling 'favourite' isn't going to win all of the time under any forecasting model because turnout will be unexpectedly high or low some of the time (it was low in 2016 relative to expectations).

It's incredibly results oriented thinking to say that having Clinton as a 70/30 fav on the raw data available was bad. Even with her underperforming polling slightly AND turnout being lower than expected, she still won the popular vote by 2%ish only to lose the electoral college, which yes, is quite possible.

Again, anyone who thinks the 70% side should 'always win' doesn't understand that 70% certainty of an event means it should happen 7 in 10 times not 10 in 10 times. This was one of the 3 in 10 times the minority outcome occurred, a less extreme example probability wise of something like when Matt Serra knocked out Georges St Pierre or [insert huge sporting upset here]

Describing 2016 as a landslide when the candidate who lost the popular vote won the electoral college despite low turnout (when high turnout favours Ds and low turnout favours Rs) is just inaccurate

2020 is going to be a turnout based election. If the Democratic nominee turns out the base out they win, if they don't they lose. Simple. They start with a natural advantage of polarising opinions of Trump making it more likely people will vote for or against him than a random candidate, but that doesn't mean anything is a lock

Re political campaigns distorting markets to change the narrative it's def a possibility. News cycles change them too but a surge in a candidate on betting markets might cause a narrative change due to favourable coverage for only 5-6 figure outlay, could be worth it for some candidates

Right not Tulsi Gabbard is trading at 4% for D nomination she has a 0% chance of winning, so that's an auto fade. Literally the same chance as Harris, who granted is cratering in the polls everywhere because 'kamala is a cop/is not your friend' is pretty accurate but she at least has a greater than 0% chance at the nomination, Tulsi is literally drawing dead

Hillary's also at 10% for the D nomination which is an easy fade as she isn't running and even if she did she'd be a dog to get it

Ya know maybe I'm wrong, I only dabble in politics betting but for you guys who are saying politics is the 'softest market out there' and talking about all this free money, I would really like to see some of your guys bets. Posted when you actually make them with the book and odds, not 2 months later when they all look unreal after the market moves in your favor.

Im not saying you guys are lying but I'm skeptical and Im not the one making any claims. I wouldnt be shocked to learn that maybe Swoop has a decent long term record at politics; he seems to have a decent grasp. But Im seeing a lot of people talking about how easy this all is while past-posting

Check my earlier posts for real-time. Here's what I like:

Trump impeached by end of 2019 - No @ 58
Will Hillary run - No @ 81
Comey face charges by 12/31/19 - No @ 87
Hillary face charges - No @ 94
Official Brexit by 11/1 - No @ 91
Will Michelle run - No @ 93
Trump Jr faces charges - No @ 93
Abedin faces charges - No @ 94
Will Bloomberg run by 10/31/19 - No @ 96
Kushner faces charges - No @ 95
Schiff Intel Cmte chair 12/31 - Yes @ 90
Trump win popular vote in 2020 - No @ 77
Don Jr publicly testify - No @ 95
Kavanaugh impeached in 2019 - No @ 98
Avenatti run in 2020 - No @ 94
Pope vacate papacy - No @ 96
Will 2020 VP nom be a woman - No @ 84
Graham confirmed AG in 2019 - No @ 96
Kushner publicly testify - No @ 95
Which party will win MN in 2020 - Democratic @ 72
Netanyahu indicted - Yes @ 66
Merkel chancellor on 12/31 - Yes @ 93
Obama endorse Biden by 12/31 - No @ 96
Hunter Biden face charges - No @ 85
Bundestag dissolved - No @ 94
Scarborough run in 2020 - No @ 92

Hillary's popular vote margin was accounted for by the huge margins in CA and NY, both of which have zero relevance with any reasonable Prez election model.

There exists a fairly simple explanation why Hillary won't run in 2020. She has no material control of the nomination process like she did in 2016 (99%) and 2008 (40%+).

lol nothing smarter than locking up money for months on end for a good old 1% return

Congrats to you people. Page 10 of the politics betting thread and it's somewhat related to politics betting. No sarcasm.

Closed out my Comey indictment position on news that Barr is leading a criminal investigation into the origins of the Russia investigation. That story is very likely BS, but there are better places for my money anyway.

Maxed out Buttigieg to win Iowa @ 21.

Anyone have advice on BR management for PredictIt?

I started out trying to not put more than 1% of my BR into a single market but could barely get half my roll invested since I was trying to focus on markets that would be closed by the end of the year at the latest. Would it be safe to increase my investments closer to 2% or should I invest the rest in long term stuff while leaving maybe 5-10% cash available for new markets that pop up?

Also, any thoughts on variance in general for PredictIt? Just curious what kind of swings would be considered normal.

It's politics. Crazy stuff can happen. But most of the time it doesn't. How's that for describing the difference between favorites and longshots? In all seriousness, though, the swings depend on how you trade. If you're buying a bunch of longshot positions hoping one or two hit, then yeah the swings will be big. If you're buying a bunch of favorites then swings will be small, although this requires a large bankroll. It just depends on how you trade. Also, you don't have to hold contracts to expiration. Many successful traders hop in and out of positions all the time.

I lost a bit in 2016 and won in the 2012 and 2008 elections. From memory I wasn't involved in 2020 - splitting my Clinton bet between win and wins popular vote mitigated the damage slightly, but it was still a loss. My biggest win was in 2008 when I got +500 in a prop with a guy who gave me Obama to sweep the swing states he won (not even including NC and IN). Biggest losing cycle to date 2016 obv

Broke even in 2018 winning in NV and losing in FL taking the Dems for sen/gov. Won't make that mistake again in FL unless the puerto rico stuff + felons getting the vote back if it ever happens truly changes the demographics.

Not getting remotely involved this far out because tying your money up for a year for a single digit roi is most certainly not the best use of my bankroll in my situation where I have a substantial but not unlimited bankroll where i'm maxing a lot but not all markets in sport - if I had pulled the trigger on Warren when she was at 6% or something sure, but I haven't found the D primary to be particularly mispriced other than fading 0%ers who are trading from like 4 to 10 along the way

I'll definitely get involved much later in the process but for now it's just fun to speculate on stuff that is value (fade the Qanon crowd, Hillary running and Tulsi etc)

I think I have as much of chance at the Democratic nomination as Tulsi Gabbard, lol

Buttigieg up to 33 to win Iowa after a very good Q poll for him: https://poll.qu.edu/iowa/release-detail?ReleaseID=3647
Top lines have it Warren 20, Buttigieg 19, Sanders 17, Biden 15.
The cross tabs are even better -- he gets a LOT of his support from people who have caucused in the past, plus he leads the second-choice voting.

I think he'll continue to benefit as Biden slumps and Warren gets negative attention for her Medicare For All plan. Right now Dems just want to win, and of the frontrunners, he's the guy who has non-crazy plans and can speak in complete sentences.

For some reason Bloomberg is at 4% to get the nomination obvious easy fade, if the Democrats wanted an egomaniac billionaire there's already Tom Steyer in the race

I just don't see who his constituency is, people have fond memories of Obama which transfer to Biden, and I doubt Buttigieg has enough cross appeal to minorities and liberals to get the nomination but they at least have a path to the nomination. What does Bloomberg have, spend 20 billion dollars and hope to just win the election through money? And that's even if he runs which he won't do unless Biden drops out pre Iowa, and surely Biden's only gonna drop out if he gets embarrassed in the early states (good chance that'll happen since Biden is bad at running for President although he might win SC and continue if another moderate doesn't take his base after winning Iowa)

Still a Buttigieg skeptic because I don't see who his base is other than white educated young moderates and there aren't enough of them, but I guess he's positioning himself as the moderate if Biden starts to fail badly so he's not drawing dead and demographically Iowa is good to him.

Yeah Bloomberg is a zero. Not gonna run.

I'm also skeptical of Buttigieg to win the whole thing, but Iowa is a good state for him. The general principle in 2008 and 2016 was, there are three major blocs in the Democratic party: blacks, white liberals, and white moderates. Obama won with blacks and liberals, Clinton won with blacks and moderates. This time around, Warren and Sanders are splitting the liberals. On a national level Biden is carrying blacks and moderates, but in Iowa he's definitely losing ground with the moderates. What happens if the 3 blocs all go different ways?

And what happens to the black vote if Biden loses Iowa and New Hampshire? Like badly, 3rd or 4th place? None of Buttigieg, Sanders, or Warren are in a position to swoop in and take it. Maybe Booker, if he can stay in the race till South Carolina.

Anybody want to bet on a brokered convention?

I always wondered why dems went after the black vote the way they do. Blacks make up 13%ish of the population. Lets say 10% are 18+. They typically get voter turnout rates around 60% so very roughly you could say that half of all black people vote, so 6-7% of the population. I realize thats a lot of people and shouldnt be ignored, but doesnt that seem super low compared to how much energy and resources they put in to target them?

In what way are the Dems "going after the black vote the way they do?"

https://edition.cnn.com/videos/polit...te-sot-vpx.cnn

Absolving them of any responsibility for their current situation, and offering them massive sums of free money?

And Poogs, please tell me you're microdosing on LSD right now, otherwise...wtf

LOL, Bloomberg at 11%

Obvious fade, i'd snap bet it if I was willing to tie up the money for months for an 11% return which i'm not

In no universe is the Democratic party going to nominate an egotistical white male billionaire politician in 2020 on a national level. It's another Tom Steyer situation. Maybe if he was an outsider type like say a progressive Mark Cuban or whatever, but Bloomberg the wall street moderate? LOL

He'll siphon 1-3% off Biden and Buttigieg then disappear if he ends up running

I think Warren is getting close to value again now she's down to 29%

In no universe does Bloomberg get the nomination more than a third as often as Warren does

Clinton who isn't running and wouldn't win if she did run + Bloomberg who has no chance are trading at a combined 18% when their combined equity is almost certainly under 1%

Re: the black vote of course it's smart to go after the black vote demographically, racist boomers are going to die, and there are still going to be black people as 10-15% of the population and yes, there will still be racist people to appeal to but less over generations as society progresses

When you add in the culturally conservative Hispanics who should be a natural conservative base that the GOP have alienated through perceived racist policies (fairly or not, I think it's fair but this isn't the thread to debate that) the GOP are starting off from a point where they need to win a huge majority of white voters just to stay level, and when they're also alienating highly educated voters, women, etc that starts getting really really hard to do. Yeah, you can win the white older male working class 75-25 or whatever but if you're losing all these other demographics it just won't matter in the long term you need to form a broad coalition demographically and if the GOP doesn't come back towards the center in coming decades they're going to basically be a rural/regional party that can't win at a national level in a few decades.

Anyway off topic rants aside, i'd say fade Bloomberg and Clinton, and leaning back towards Warren being value (I still see her as a 40%+ fav in the current climate unless her early state support starts to crater - the media are going after her atm because they want a horse race again, if Bernie doesn't siphon off enough of her support to keep them both in the race after the early states she'll win)

why tie up money when PI will pay you for playing there? it's society's way of rewarding you for being an informed citizen.