People who bet money on the winner of the Iowa caucus are still waiting for a victor to be crowned as potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars are wrapped up in the chaos that has followed the bungling of the contest.
Former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Bernie Sanders sit atop the prediction market PredictIt, which has yet to close its Iowa caucus market as the state began a vote recount in some precincts on Tuesday after irregularities in digital vote counting kept the Iowa Democratic Party from declaring a winner.
“Due to the recount and pending final official results, this market is still open,” a spokesman for PredictIt told the Washington Examiner. “You can see by the ‘stats’ page on the market that in total, over the entire lifetime of the market, there have been 24,848,381 shares traded, with 3,660,228 active shares still being held by traders.”
The spokesman noted the shares should be presented in one-to-one dollar amounts and that PredictIt had received no complaints from the market’s extension, which is most likely because the market’s rules stipulated the possibility of a lengthened process.
PredictIt, which is the largest certified political prediction market in the United States, is still accepting trades even though the election was held more than three weeks ago. Hundreds of replies filled the comments section underneath the market’s page as users argued for their favorite.
“Traders are able to trade until the final official results are published. There’s even been trading today based on the recount news,” the spokesman said.
Buttigieg and Sanders both claimed victory in the week following the Iowa caucus, but analysts believe it could be weeks if not months before a winner is officially declared.
