Tuesday, 4 October 2022

Political betting - thinking aloud

As we all know, I've had some decent wins on political bets and also - see the same link - some very good advice for Liz Truss. I'm sorry to say that Truss has ignored my advice, with consequences that we see on the news every day at the moment. That's a bit of a blow for the country, but can I make up for it by giving some good advice for future betting success? Why, yes I can!

What we are looking for is good value in the market. The kinds of question we should ask ourselves are of the kind "have the bookies miscalculated in any area" or "are they underestimating the chances of certain low-chance outcomes (e.g. the elevation of the likes of Macron or Truss)?" 

I've looked at oddschecker for the latest odds across the various bookies. My full workings are below the break but if you just want the TLDR then my view is that the best value bets right now are (1) Badenoch for next PM, (2) Rayner for PM after the next General Election and (3) 2023 for the date of the next GE. You might also want to think about placing bets on a Lab-SNP coalition or a minority Conservative administration after the next GE.

But please remember that this is meant to be fun: none of these outcomes is at all likely! The point is to force oneself to think dispassionately about the likelihood of various different futures, not to win or lose meaningful amounts of money. The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong; but that is the way to bet if you want to win money.