Who Gamblers Think Will Win the Nomination

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published
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Who Gamblers Think Will Win the Nomination

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Most Americans look at polls as forecasts of who will win the Democratic nomination. They tend to view these numbers through their eyes of voters. Another group is likely to be just as interested. These are people who bet real money on the outcomes.

Two major and well-known groups of professional gamblers have given the best odds to win the nomination to Elizabeth Warren who does not lead the field in any widely regarded poll. She is followed in both cases by front-runner Joe Biden and in third and fourth places are Bernie Sanders and Kamala Harris, but not in that order based on the two betting pools.

Gambling site Bovada, which is carefully followed by people who bet on poker, casino games and horse racing has a system in which the candidate who posts the lowest number has the greatest chance of winning, a system widely used when describing odds. Based on this gambling operation Odds Shark puts Warren’s number as +225. Biden’s is +250. Harris follows at +550. Sanders is at +650. Odds Shark betting experts have an explanation for Warren’s position. “We saw a shift in momentum following her town hall in late April when not only did she outline in more depth her platform, but she also detailed how she would go about making her platform a reality. She has a strong economic background as a former bankruptcy lawyer and also appeals to the young voters with her plans for free college, free health care and wiping away student debts.”

PredictIt is a gambling site which only covers politics. The operation is run by Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, which is a non-profit school. Gambling on PredictIt covers the presidential race and races for the Senate and House. It also offers betting on presidential primaries. Gamblers can vote “yes” or “no” to whether a candidate will win a race, so odds are expressed in dollars. Under this system, the candidates which have the highest “yes” investments are those the gamblers think is most likely to win.

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PredictIt puts Warren’s figure at 33 cents. Biden is next at 27 cents. He is followed by Sanders at 16 cents and Harris at 13 cents.

While the two widely used gambling sites do not agree entirely on who is in the third and fourth places, they do agree on who should be the fun runner. That is not Biden, who finishes first in almost all national polls, but Warren, who often finishes second.

For more election coverage, readers can find out how likely people are to vote in their states, based on 24/7 Wall St. numbers.

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Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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