[Momaw Nadon]

Intrade.com is a futures market in which people bet on the outcomes of various things such as the results of elections.

According to the current trading prices of the futures contracts, an estimate can be found of what traders are betting will be the outcome of 2008 Presidential Election.

If the traders are correct, John McCain would receive 245 Electoral Votes and Barack Obama would receive 293 Electoral Votes.

If the weighted probabilities of John McCain winning in the states are added up, and then divided by 538, and multiplied by 100, then John McCain should get 242.62 Electoral Votes.

270 Electoral Votes are needed to win the Presidency.

Opinions and commentary are welcome.

[Momaw Nadon]

Previous projections:

2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 8/4/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 7/28/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 7/21/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 7/14/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 7/7/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 6/30/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 6/23/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 6/16/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 6/9/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 6/2/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 5/26/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 5/19/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 5/12/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 5/5/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 4/28/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 4/21/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 4/14/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 4/7/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 3/31/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 3/24/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 3/17/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 3/10/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 3/3/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 2/25/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 2/18/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 2/11/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 2/4/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 1/28/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 1/21/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 1/14/2008
2008 Projected Presidential Electoral Votes as of 1/7/2008

[Momaw Nadon]

[Momaw Nadon]

If you want on (or off) of the weekly InTrade Projected Presidential Electoral Vote ping list, please let me know via FREEPmail.

[rfp1234]

Mich., Ohio, and NH are not shoo-ins for the RATS.

[Gay State Conservative]

This “trading” that's done....is it only US citizens or can anyone “trade”? If the latter is the case....and if foreigners represent an important portion of the total “trading” then these results would be pretty useless I'd say.

[MinorityRepublican]

So it comes down to Ohio.....

[Notasoccermom]

It’s a long time ‘til November and Americans have short attention spans.

[Jet Jaguar]

Obama was at 311 last week.

[silentreignofheroes]

Come on Alabama,you can do better than that,Gee Wiz !

[PackerBoy]

McCain wins Ohio. Guaranteed.

[PackerBoy]

If McCain chooses Romney as his VP, he wins Ohio, Michigan and the presidential election.

[comebacknewt]

Still good bargains to be had in Ohio and Colorado.

[Wholly Ghost]

I understand there is no love lost between McCain and former (cringe) Sen. Santorum but what a choice it would be!

[Salvation]

McCain is up from 227 Electoral Votes a week ago.

Slowly and surely this will all reverse.

[Political Junkie Too]

Using the probabilities above, the results of 20,000 simulated elections are listed in the table below. The "GOP Electoral Votes" is the expected value (probability weighted average). The "Probability of 270" is the point on the cumulative probability distribution for 270 electoral votes or higher.

Week	GOP Electoral Votes	Probability of 270
7-Jan	241.05	20.18%
14-Jan	235.29	14.70%
21-Jan	234.76	14.66%
28-Jan	236.58	15.44%
4-Feb	236.26	15.41%
11-Feb	237.25	16.43%
18-Feb	230.61	12.69%
25-Feb	233.56	15.44%
3-Mar	234.54	16.27%
10-Mar	240.26	22.49%
17-Mar	244.58	24.60%
24-Mar	249.73	28.50%
31-Mar	252.18	30.87%
7-Apr	248.97	27.60%
14-Apr	249.24	27.62%
21-Apr	247.86	25.60%
28-Apr	251.65	29.06%
5-May	250.84	28.07%
12-May	252.31	29.25%
19-May	248.73	25.99%
26-May	250.15	27.10%
2-Jun	248.98	26.46%
9-Jun	247.87	26.81%
16-Jun	248.41	26.06%
23-Jun	233.92	15.76%
30-Jun	234.84	16.21%
14-Jul	237.43	19.14%
21-Jul	231.61	14.15%
28-Jul	233.21	15.18%
4-Aug	234.45	16.45%
11-Aug	242.62	21.56%

For comparison, the results of 20,000 simulations of another model based on Rasmussen state-by-state polls as of 11-Aug are: GOP Electoral Votes = 234.99, Probability of 270 = 4.16%. The sensitivity of the Rasmussen state-by-state polls is such that a 1.25% reduction in Obama polling and a 1.25% increase in McCain polling results in 264.60 Electoral Votes for McCain, with a 41.31% chance of winning.

-PJ