Oh god, do we have to bet on Brexit this week?
No seriously, after two great weeks to start off 2019 we’re now suddenly thrust into a situation with three out of the four tweet markets already dead or on life support and nothing else seemingly going on (save us Mike Pence). The latest OPM shutdown market is now petering out after some rather amazing weather-related gyrations over the weekend (don’t ask if you haven’t been following that one) ending in a classic rules debate with smart people split on both sides. You can still place a wager there that Trump and Congress sort this thing out by Friday (or that PI chooses to pay out January 14) but it seems fairly well-cooked at this point.
There’s always polling markets?
True. And at least this week we are due for some polls on the shutdown. As I write this, Quinnipiac is set to release their latest in about an hour. For the rest of your Monday, you have Scott Rasmussen / HarrisX, YouGov daily, and any other surprises like the Civis Analytics that got posted around 12:30 pm. So there’s still some life! RCP TA has fewer polls to look forward to (as usual) but with relatively few polls on the board at least each update will move the average a lot. I honestly can’t believe I have to bet more heavily than usual in there to make money this week…
So yeah. Brexit?
The vote (or first such vote) on Theresa May’s Brexit plan apparently takes place tomorrow, and we have a market on how many MPs go for it (in what’s apparently expected to be a losing effort). So a good little one-day research project, if you’re up for it, as there’s still a bit of money to be made here! So yay learning new things or something?
2020 stuff
You can always churn shares in the 2020 markets of course. We should be getting the latest installment of the CNN/DMR Iowa poll soon, and I’m watching that to see how much pop Warren gets out of her early visit there (and for being the first big one to declare).
Trump is also down to a recent low in the overall 2020 market, sinking sub-30 for the first time since the market opened. This I would expect to recover into the mid-30s after the shutdown is resolved and his approval stops taking on water. Or of course keep falling if the slog of poor news continues. (And/or if any economic indicators start to actually show real evidence of recession).
Predicting Politics 