iPredict Accuracy
First have a look at this page detailing the accuracy of iPredict over the last year.
Eric Crampton explains some of it here.
And my weekly picks are out:
Bye Bye Wanganui
The market thinks Wanganui is a goner, with CITY.WANGANUI languishing at just under 10c. CITY.WHANGANUI is at 60c, having dropped from 80c earlier in the week. I thought it was over-priced at 80c and sold at 75c as a dual name is a real option and CITY.BOTH is trading at 20c.
Sell of the Week
ZIM.MUGABE pays out if Mugabe goes by the end of the year. It started the year at 75c and is now at 13c. There is nothing to suggest he could lose power by year end so a sell now gets a 15% return over three months.
A tale of two parties
There are two stocks – MP.TIZARD and MP.POWELL that will pay $1 if a List MP leaves Parliament before the next election for the Labour and National parties, as that will see Judith Tizard and Conway Powell respectively enter Parliament.
Now their caucuses are of similar size – 43 MP and 58 MPs, so one would expect MP.TIZARD to be no less than three quarters the price of MP.POWELL. However the Tizard stock is at 20c and Powell at 57c. So what explains the difference? My pick is that the Labour leadership will move heaven and earth not to lose a List MP for the next two years, as a return of Tizard would damage their brand. That certainly seems to be the assumption the market is making.
Highest Trading Stocks
The 91.OCT09 petrol series had trades of over $13,000. CONFSEP09.VHIGH traded close to $6,000 and CITY.WHANGANUI has $3,000 of trades.
October 7th, 2009 at 5:50 pm
Or, Labour might lose an MP but not bring Judith back. Perhaps she is no longer available? The way the stock is written seems to allow that as an outcome.
October 7th, 2009 at 6:14 pm
DPF, apart from the appalling formatting of the blockquote (did you copy it straight from MSWord), don’t you have a pecuniary interest in iPredict?
If so, when you blog here on iPredict, especially when you are promoting its virtues, should you not disclose that each time?
I’m not suggesting there is a legal requirement to do so – I certainly don’t want that around my neck on things I blog either. But I think it would be best for all bloggers to disclose a pecuniary interest if they have one in things they are blogging about.
I’m keen for a similar regime for Parliament, and can’t see why we shouldn’t have a voluntary code to so so here in the blogosphere as well.
Mind you, phil u would have to disclose every time he ever blogged about welfare policy, which could get a bit tiresome.
[DPF: You are wrong. I have no pecuniary interest in iPredict. I blog about iPredict because I love it. My disclosure statement discloses I get paid to write the weekly analysis for them]
October 7th, 2009 at 6:19 pm
Toad – pretty much all of DPF’s other posts on iPredict do have that disclaimer. If you click on the iPredict tag you can see them, it is usually in the format:
It looks like this time it is only an extract of his column, and omits the disclosure.
His disclosure page also says:
I agree it is reasonable to point out the omission this time, but there are a hell of a lot of bloggers with far less disclosure than DPF habitually provides.
[DPF: I don't think Toad was talking about the fact I speculate at iPredict. I read his post as suggesting I had an ownership stake]
October 7th, 2009 at 6:24 pm
Fair enough, PaulL. But I wouldn’t say “pretty much all”. I have seen ones from DPF here that do. I’ve also seen ones that don’t. I don’t have time to research it, but my recollection is probably a similar number each way.
October 7th, 2009 at 6:29 pm
DPF – I thought I recalled a post from you some time ago acknowledging that you did have a pecuniary interest. But I didn’t go back to search and check it.
If you have no pecuniary interest, Mr Speaker, I withdraw and apologise.
October 7th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
“DPF – I thought I recalled a post from you some time ago acknowledging that you did have a pecuniary interest. ”
As long as you are not living in a house (that you do not own) owned by your superanuation trust fund (that you do not have a pecuniary interest in) and are not paying twice the market rent for, you should be OK David. But just be warned if you keep bringing up these embarassing facts about the Greens you better be very, very careful.—-Toad is watching you.
October 7th, 2009 at 8:59 pm
DPF – “My pick is that the Labour leadership will move heaven and earth not to lose a List MP for the next two years, as a return of Tizard would damage their brand. That certainly seems to be the assumption the market is making.”
Or another interpretation might be the market is assuming Nats will be losing an MP to some scandal or another
October 7th, 2009 at 9:12 pm
I’m picking Laboour will lose Chris Carter.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:59 am
Why doesn’t some non-Maori person just come out and say:
“WE DON”T LIKE YOUR HORRIBLE NEGATIVE CULTURE!”
It doesn’t have to be a Caucasian (they call us Pakeha).
Why not a nice Indian, Samoan, Tongan, Chinese person?
Just come out and say it!
If you don’t like it here fuck off back to Hawaii!
But if you want to live here in harmony then pull yoiur fucking head’s in.
Come on support Mike Law’s.
For God’s sake someone else say it!!
The country will support you!!
It is not ugly white supremacy.
It is beautiful anti- Maori supremacy!
October 8th, 2009 at 8:59 am
If Judith Tizard is so damaging to their brand, why was she on their list at all, let alone high enough to have a risk of being returned as an MP? Her electorate didn’t want her…