Obama is back up to 75 on Intrade

[Hokie]

I guess the "big news" from the McCain campaign was a "big fizzle".

?contractId=409933&intradeChart=true&transBackground=true&transBackground=true

[Demi_Babe]

1. AWESOME

[Schulzz]

2. At the person who wasted his/her money last night:

[Hokie]

3. Someone got a bargain on Obama futures

I am not exactly sure how Intrade futures work but according to my math if you purchased Obama futures at 65 you made a cool 15% in less than a day.

[Hamlette]

4. what was the "big news"?

[No Passaran]

5. There was no big news. Look at the forum for them

They say this happens all the time, a big buyer comes in, sells at big and they buys at low and leaves.

[JTFrog]

6. There has been speculation that the market was being manipulated in favor of McCain for a while.

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/09/intrade-betting-is-suspcious.html

Intrade Betting is Suspicious

There's something funny going on over at Intrade with respect to the pricing of the Obama and McCain contracts.

Right now, Obama is trading at 52.3 points. That is, Intrade implies that he has a 52.3 percent chance to become the next President.

Now, I happen to think that is a patently absurd price. But you don't have to take my word for it. Over at BetFair, another large UK-based gambling and futures site, you can also buy an Obama contract. But the price there is 1.62, which implies a 61.7 percent chance that Obama will become the next President.

That is a huge spread, 51.5 points versus 61.7 points. This is the equivalent of the Giants being 3-point favorites at the Bellagio Sportsbook, and 7-point favorites at the Mirage down the block.

....................................

It's pretty obvious that this is not some sort of random walk. Rather, every so often, some individual trader or some small group of traders are shorting all the Obama contacts in bulk and resetting the entire market. The markets then organically climb back upward until the rogue trader strikes again six or eight hours later. The volumes on these contracts have been very high for the past week as a result.