Trump’s odds of winning presidency spike on Polymarket despite recent polls favoring Harris

Over the weekend, former President Donald Trump’s odds on the decentralized prediction market platform Polymarket experienced a notable increase, rising from 44% to 49%. This shift has brought him nearly even with Vice President Kamala Harris, whose odds fell from 54% to 49%. Despite Harris maintaining a slight lead, this change highlights a closely contested race. Polymarket users have placed over $630 million in bets on the presidential outcome, with additional bets on swing states and other related outcomes.

However, Trump stands a better chance on the platform as of late, at the same time that the polls are tilted in Harris’ favor. An organization considered to be right-leaning, Rasmussen Research, has Harris leading in battleground states such as Michigan and Pennsylvania. National polls reflect a similar trend, with RealClearPolitics’ average showing Harris ahead by 1.5 points. On the other hand, the Economist’s average indicates a 2.7-point lead.

Nate Silver and The Economist Predict Harris Victory Despite Polymarket Shift

However, this trend on Polymarket is not yet reflected in the other prediction markets. In Betfair, the second-largest prediction market, Harris leads Trump by roughly 5 points, and in PredictIt, which is one of the very few markets available to US residents, Harris is ahead by about 10 points. These disparities imply that people in the stock market have different beliefs about the election.

Mathematical models also persist to support Harris. Besides, Nate Silver, the founder of FiveThirtyEight and adviser to Polymarket, sets the probability of Harris’s victory in the electoral college at 53.5%, whereas Trump: 45.9%. Silver says that although Trump’s odds have increased by 5% on Polymarket recently, the contest remains “essentially 50/50,” with Harris marginally favored.

The Economist also has similar sentiments on this matter, specifically saying that Harris would triumph in the electoral vote by 272 to 266 for Trump. These differences can be attributed to the fact that the current election race is ever-changing and hard to predict.