Donald Trump has hit a hiccup in the betting markets after a flurry of bets on Kamala Harris.
The former president had boomed on a number of gambling platforms, but the money has shifted to Harris in recent days.
With four days until the election, prominent betting website Kalshi had Trump’s chances of winning at 53 percent, compared to 47 percent for Harris.
On Tuesday, the former president was at 64 percent and Harris at 36 percent.
Republican presidential candidate and former US President Donald Trump during a rally in Henderson, Nevada, USA, October 31, 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris is making gains in the gambling markets
Meanwhile, on Polymarket, Trump’s odds of winning fell from 67 percent on October 30 to 59 percent on Friday afternoon.
The political prediction site Predictit had Trump with a lead of just two points on Friday.
On October 29, his lead on the site was 14 points.
In the same period – October 29 to November 1 – Trump’s odds on both bookmakers Bet365 and Paddy Power fell from 66.7 percent to 63.6 percent.
Kalshi still had Trump with a better chance of winning five of the seven key battleground states: Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina and Pennsylvania.
But it gives Harris a better chance in Michigan and Wisconsin.
Pennsylvania is very close with Trump at 52 percent and Harris at 48 percent as of Friday afternoon.
Live election betting on a digital kiosk on a New York City street
According to the Real Clear Politics betting markets average, Trump still led Harris 60.6 percent to 38.1 percent.
Earlier this week, however, the Republican candidate was at 63.9 percent.
The polls have the election close to a close and essentially tied, but the betting markets have consistently given Trump a clear advantage for weeks.
It was unclear what caused the shift in the gambling markets in recent days.
On October 27, a comedian made a disparaging joke about Puerto Rico at Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden in New York, sparking widespread backlash.
Kalshi, America’s first legal online betting platform for election predictions, has already placed $92 million in bets on the 2024 race.
Kamala Harris was far behind in the betting markets
A gambler makes a decision about the election
This week, Tarek Mansour, the CEO, said bettors are a more accurate indicator of the outcome than the polls because they have “skin in the game.”
He told DailyMail.com: ‘We certainly have to rely on the [wagering] markets.
“Prediction markets are places where people have money on the line. People don’t lie with their money.’
In 2016, polls indicated that Hillary Clinton would easily beat Trump, but they were wrong.
In the past, betting markets have proven successful in predicting the outcome of elections.
But like the polls, they were not a good indicator in 2016.
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton shake hands after the presidential debate in Hempstead, NY, September 26, 2016
the betting markets were wrong in 1948 when President Harry S. Truman won; Here he cheerfully displays a premature early edition of the Chicago Daily Tribune from his train in St. Louis, Missouri, after his defeat of Thomas E. Dewey
As early as 1924, the Wall Street Journal wrote, “Betting is generally regarded as the best indicator of likely results in presidential campaigns.”
According to the newspaper, bookmakers at the time sent people to candidates’ speeches and based their odds on the audience’s reaction.
According to a study by economists Paul Rhode and Koleman Strumpf, in the fifteen presidential elections from 1884 to 1940, there was only one upset when the bookmakers were wrong.
In 1948, however, the betting markets, like the polls, were spectacularly wrong when they gave President Harry Truman only about a one-in-ten chance of winning.