I remember being perplexed looking at the intrade exchange pricing during the last presidential election. I wasn't the only one. Nate Silver and Paul Graham wondered about it too
The bets on Obama not being re-elected seemed way too high. I convinced myself at the time that this must have been due to either personal bias or perhaps a strong republican leaning userbase on Intrade. But now it's starting to seem like it may have been part of some scam.
I assumed this was because a pool of funds had been set up to prop up Romney's odds to make him appear more viable -- or at least to stave off a story that Intrade users were betting heavily against him. Intrade was a small enough market that this could have been done with a comparatively small investment compared to media buys, and without any technological or financial chicanery. It's not illegal to pay too much for something that could have been had for less.
It would be elegant and pleasing if we could resolve both mysteries with one stone, but I don't see how it's supposed to work. How does a Romney anomaly lead to $700k embezzled and Intrade suing 2 different parties for $3m+?
http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/24/oct-23-t...
https://twitter.com/intent/retweet?tweet_id=2615138971341414...
The bets on Obama not being re-elected seemed way too high. I convinced myself at the time that this must have been due to either personal bias or perhaps a strong republican leaning userbase on Intrade. But now it's starting to seem like it may have been part of some scam.