Saturday, April 2, 2011

Election Stock Market for the 41st Canadian Federal Election

In the past Werner Antweiler of the UBC Sauder School of Business has operated an election stock market.   He will not be doing so this time, which is a shame, though the UBC ESM site has some very good forecasting tools.  I have loved being part of the market in the past and miss it each time they do not run it.   Well they are no longer the only show in town.  Intrade is offering election prediction markets for the current Canadian election.

I have signed up for an account and would love to see all you political pundits out there to sign up for your own account and trade on the market to see if you can predict this election or not.   If you sign up, let me know how you are doing and I will post it here.   I think I may offer a personal prize for the person that has the best return on the market over the campaign.   If I do that I will write up the details of how I would measure it, I will make up my mind for certain within a few days.

The Markets on Offer

  • Which party will win the most seats?
  • Which party will win an outright majority?
  • Will the federal election lead to the formation of a coalition government?
  • Will there be a majority government after the election?
  • Which party will form the opposition?
  • When will the next federal election be?
  • Will the Green Party elect an MP?


I wish they had the seat prediction market that the UBC ESM normally runs, it is my favorite market.

All these markets are yes/no answers so you are paid out 100% on your shares that are correct at the close of the market.  Not that the which party will win an outright majority could end up with all the shares being worth zero.

I think the Green MP and majority or not markets will be the most interesting ones.

Once there is some motion in the market, I will post the current market values on the blog

3 comments:

Reg said...

Bernard: I'm with you, I have loved the UBC election stock market. I just had a quick look at the Itrade market. It doesn't look very interesting and I think I will pass for now, but have bookmarked it so may come back later

John Delaney, CEO, Intrade said...

Intrade has a number of Prediction Markets on the Canadian election and we also have a virtual currency platform.

Perhaps the college or students would like to use either of our platforms and we could offer $100 to the registrant with a UBC .edu address who generates the greatest ROI on Canadian political trading.

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