SkyBet and Ladbrokers for example both have payouts closer to 538's forecast.
What is peculiar is that Intrade is the outlier. In a liquid market this shouldn't happen because it allows for risk-free payouts. So something seems a bit odd about Intrade.
It's possible the campaigns have caught on to Intrade's impact on the media and will now step in when prices fall to much. </conspiracy>
It isn't entirely liquid. It's a pain to get money into Intrade (esp. for an American).
IEM (http://iemweb.biz.uiowa.edu/quotes/Pres12_quotes.html) and Intrade were up until yesterday off by 10%. Eventually things moved closer, but regulatory hurdles in actually getting money in (+ limits on funding) really hurt arbitrage opportunities.
It's really not difficult at all to get money into Intrade as an American. I had wires show up day-of if I did it early enough or next-day in every other case.
Also of note is that other betting markets were consistently higher than Intrade was for all of the last 6 months basically- there are a lot of theories as to why this may be, but it's regularly been 5%+ lower on Obama.
SkyBet and Ladbrokers for example both have payouts closer to 538's forecast.
What is peculiar is that Intrade is the outlier. In a liquid market this shouldn't happen because it allows for risk-free payouts. So something seems a bit odd about Intrade.
It's possible the campaigns have caught on to Intrade's impact on the media and will now step in when prices fall to much. </conspiracy>