Is this a sure thing? (Betfair us election)

Hodders

Hodders

Hodders

Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
5,284
Location
Riding my bike
Right now Betfair still have Joe biden at 1.06 to 1 to win the popular vote.

Why is there still money to be taken on this?

There is no way they will overturn 4 million votes. Is this free money?

It looks to good to be true, surely it must be.
 
Hodders said:
Right now Betfair still have Joe biden at 1.06 to 1 to win the popular vote.

Why is there still money to be taken on this?

There is no way they will overturn 4 million votes. Is this free money?

It looks to good to be true, surely it must be.
Click to expand...

Well it's still not 100%. Trump just lost Arizona so it's like 99.8% but he's got a recount in Georgia, he's hoping for a recount in Michigan, he believes he's found enough votes in Pennsylvania to win that state, even still I think he'd still need Arizona or Nevada. So it's still not impossible for trump to win, not likely at all that's why they are still taking bets.

The point is you'd need to put on around £50000 for any decent return and if by miracle trump loses then you lose a lot.
 
Well there is some small amount of risk there but seems like it's been badly priced.... just as on election night when it looked like it was getting close to a coin flip with the in person votes and betfair odds for Biden went above like 3 for a bit... numpties getting hyped up too much.

There are some idiots who perhaps still believe all the nonsense about him being a possible dictator or launching a "coup" or somehow the Supreme court awarding the election to him being much more likely than it is in reality.

In the end it's basically the same thing - people overvalue long shots.

As a result you're getting naff odds on the real chance of Trump actually doing that if you did want to bet on it and you're getting value betting on Biden (well there is of course commission, crossing the spread and potential premium chage to pay mind).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Favourite-longshot_bias
 
I wouldn't put anything past Trump - he was clever enough to get elected in the first place, I wouldn't be surprised if he manages to avoid losing somehow!
 
You’ll be making 6p for every £1 you stake. Is it really worth risking so much money to make the profit worthwhile? Not only could this drag on for a while (trump hasn’t conceded) but who knows what the next twist and turn will be.
 
jsmoke said:
Trump just lost Arizona so it's like 99.8% but he's got a recount in Georgia, he's hoping for a recount in Michigan, he believes he's found enough votes in Pennsylvania to win that state, even still I think he'd still need Arizona or Nevada. So it's still not impossible for trump to win, not likely at all that's why they are still taking bets.
Click to expand...

You're talking about winning the election. The OP said winning the popular vote.
If OP is correct, that looks like free money to me.
 
There is no way that they will overturn nearly 5.5million votes. Biden may be "only" 99.999% certain to win the election, but he surely has 100% won the popular vote.

The real question is when Betfair will call the market. I might have £3000 tied up for 2 or 3 months, but where else can I get 3% interest over that period of time?
 
So my understanding is Betfair is a betting exchange, so in order for there to be a bet available like this someone must be putting it up as an available bet? They're going to be onto thousands if not millions in losses surely?
 
Depends what you're betting on and what they pay out on...

Chances of Biden winning the popular vote: 100%
Chances of Biden getting 270 electoral votes after the recount: 99.999%
Chances of Biden becoming next president based on votes by the electoral members: 99%

Remember that the electoral colleage still has one last problem for Biden, and that's "faithless electors". Amazing as it may sound, there's still a legitmate chance, regardless of the outcome of all the lawsuits and recounts, that Trump gets voted in. Massively unlikely but totally a legitmate thing that can happen.

Some states have laws that stop this, but of the 538 electoral collage votes in 2016, 10 voted for the oposite party from which they were supposed to. 3 where stopped by state laws, Clinton lost 5 votes and Trump lost 2 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_electors_in_the_2016_United_States_presidential_election)

Assuming Biden only keeps 290 votes (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news...ld-trump-presidential-electoral-college-votes) it will only take 11 people (1 more than last year) to try to change their vote in Trumps favour.

It's been a whacky couple of years of extremes, so that genuniely doens't seem that far fetched to me...
 
RoyMi6 said:
Remember that the electoral colleage still has one last problem for Biden, and that's "faithless electors". Amazing as it may sound, there's still a legitmate chance, regardless of the outcome of all the lawsuits and recounts, that Trump gets voted in. Massively unlikely but totally a legitmate thing that can happen.
Click to expand...
There's been 165 faithless electors in the entire history of the US. 63 came in 1 election where the nominee died. Most go 3rd party, not Red/Blue.

There's zero chance of 37 faithless electors all going to Trump unless Biden drops dead in the next 2 months, and even then I'm not sure Trump would win.
 
Last edited:
Hodders said:
Why is there still money to be taken on this?
Click to expand...

There's still results from 3-4 Democrat run swing states allegedly rife with corruption and somehow unable to count their ballots to come in, legal challenges are ongoing. Biden is not President elect yet despite the corporate media acting like he is, the results still need to be certified.

You'd be better off putting a fiver on Kamala Harris, Biden looks like he could croak it at any moment.
 
This is NOT a bet on next president (which does have uncertainty), but a proposed bet on the POPULAR vote which seems to me to be set in stone unless the election is cancelled (unthinkable) in which case all stakes are returned.
 
Hodders said:
This is NOT a bet on next president (which does have uncertainty), but a proposed bet on the POPULAR vote which seems to me to be set in stone unless the election is cancelled (unthinkable) in which case all stakes are returned.
Click to expand...

It's not read the rules:

This market will be settled according to the candidate that has the most projected Electoral College votes won at the 2020 presidential election. Any subsequent events such as a ‘faithless elector’ will have no effect on the settlement of this market. In the event that no Presidential candidate receives a majority of the projected Electoral College votes, this market will be settled on the person chosen as President in accordance with the procedures set out by the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Click to expand...

Biden is NOT president elect yet anyone who thinks he is has been watching too much mainstream media with their brain disengaged.
 
Last edited:
mmj_uk said:
Biden is NOT president elect yet.
Click to expand...

President-elect is not a term of art, it's a media term. It's not in their constiution

The popular vote has been called in enough states to swing it for Biden, and many US state legislatures have passed laws requiring electors to follow the popular vote
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom