Live data from Hacker News

Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

theguardian.com

241–250 of 263 posts

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#241
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Prediction Markets require insider trading to function. And yet there are folks like me who have been on them for years before kalshi/polymarket making a very good side income from them without having insider knowledge. Prediction markets as a whole are very very inefficient. That's not to say that insider trading doesn't exist but you can't claim that they require insider trading to function.

> making a very good side income If you had a reliable edge, your income would be exponential. Why isn’t it?

Do you need a reliable edge or just a slightly better than average edge?

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Insider trading is unethical, and has long been recognized as such. It is outrageous for you to suggest that it is a good thing. It is not a free market if there is insider trading. If insiders are trading other market participants are by definition getting screwed by what was advertised as a fair, impartial system. You certainly wouldn't participate in a market where you did not think you had fair odds. Tho maybe yo…

> Insider trading is unethical It is illegal to insider trade in financial markets, which makes sense to me. But financial markets and prediction markets are different; one exists to surface capital, the other information. Insider trading is forbidden in financial markets because allowing it would be a disincentive to participation by non-insiders, which would be bad because it would reduce the amount of capital the…

You're conflating insider trading and blatant corruption.

Imagine if a CEO of a company does something that would damage the price of the stock of it's own company, having shorted the stock before? That's not insider trading, that's (probably, I don't know the exact term) fraud and will lead to prison sentence.

Prediction markets enable the policymakers to make these bets. Arguably, there should probably be sorts of limit on who is allowed to be there. But there are still counter examples like Nancy Pelosi who somehow manages to go around these limitations in stock market.

That's whats currently happening.

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#243
post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not true at all. A great example was this market from the most recent primary election. https://kalshi.com/markets/kxtxsenatedemturnout/voter-turnou... Based on just simple math there was basically no chance of turnout being over 2.5m and yet the market for multiple days had the higher buckets at exorbitant prices.

The turnaround was 2.3m, I don't get your point. Texas doesn't require party affiliation.

Correct and the higher brackets above 2.5m were at 50-70 cents each.

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#244
post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Prediction Markets require insider trading to function. And yet there are folks like me who have been on them for years before kalshi/polymarket making a very good side income from them without having insider knowledge. Prediction markets as a whole are very very inefficient. That's not to say that insider trading doesn't exist but you can't claim that they require insider trading to function.

> making a very good side income If you had a reliable edge, your income would be exponential. Why isn’t it?

The markets I participate in tend to be illiquid, but as prediction markets get more popular things are getting better on that front.

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Occam would disagree.

occam doesn't work in financial markets. because if it did you would print money by following occam.

But it does work in conspiracy theories which is what we have here.

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#246
post #100

Say whatever you want about the merits of prediction markets. But I just don't see a way those benefits outweigh the societal dangers of these constant reminders that people in or close to power can freely profit from their positions in the ways the rest of the population can't. There's always talk about the dangers of disincentivizing job creators, but what happens when a society routinely disincentives job havers i…

>>You'll need to look for your own individual scheme, ethics be damned

This is remarkably similar to how workers in the Soviet Union got ahead. Your job provided a lot of ways to make money on the side, none of them were beneficial to productivity/trust. I think this kind of reality might just be normal for societies in collapse (also, "gerontocracy")

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The current setup does sort of seem like a tax on being stupid. Why would any non-insider participate in these markets? You’re just asking to get screwed. Though it’s not that different from the stock market, where the folks at WSB happily give their money to Citadel, Jane Street, and friends, because every once a while, one of them hits it big after going all in that the ball lands on green. Gambling is a hell of a…

> The current setup does sort of seem like a tax on being stupid. More like a tax on being ethical or having any morality.

Yeah, if your “virtue” is “not being able to participate”.

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That also sounds easy enough to fake for some plausible deniability.

Traders have been using satellite images from around the world for DECADES, it seems more likely to be true than a conspiracy from a insider who actually makes the decision or has first line access to it.

If I have access to expensive real-time satellite imagery, I am not blasting my insights on Twitter.

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Information" is not neutrally reflective of some objective, deterministic reality. Processes involving information are slippery and reflexive, and that's the danger people are all but shouting for you to see. The feedback loops have extreme potential. The danger isn't in "exposing information" it's in people coercing reality to fit their bet. Peoples' lives are on the line. The wild thing is that prediction market d…

This sounds like a poor attempt at attempting to be on the right side of morality through manipulation and shame. There is nothing here that tries to help someone understand your viewpoint. Let's start of with something simple. Should a single wager between two people be illegal, should sports betting at all be legal? Is it only illegal if one or more entities facilitate the bet?

I didn't say anything about illegality, I'm speaking strictly in terms of the ethics of please stop shitting in the pool shame on you.

Don't poop in the public swimming pool and don't feed perverse war games that result in children and their parents being maimed and killed.

Re: Traders placed over $1B in perfectly timed bets on the Iran war

#250

Prediction Markets require insider trading to function... how do people not know this? It's a setup from day one. If you have the knowledge, you're going to cash in, if you don't have the knowledge, you are throwing your money away.

The theory would be that the people without information pay for knowledge. Or to hedge against certain events. Similarly to how people would pay premium over inusrance

that is what they sold you... that is not the theory.
Post reply on HN