当美国中期选举的投票于周二晚间截止时，诺亚·波泽将紧盯着手机，追踪他在预测市场上下的数十笔大额押注。
When polls close in the US midterm elections on Tuesday night, Noah Poser will be glued to his phone tracking dozens of large wagers he placed on prediction markets.
现年28岁、从事金融科技工作并撰写过此类市场投注策略文章的波泽，计划在纽约市一位朋友的观选派对上，追踪每一次选票计数的变化。
Poser, 28, who works in financial technology and has written about betting strategies in such markets, plans to track every change in the vote count from a friend's watch party in New York City.
他说，他押注的总价值达六位数，押注民主党表现强劲，并在几个月前赔率价格好得多时入场。如果获胜，他预计利润高达3万美元。
He said he has wagers with a total value in the six figures on the line, betting on a strong showing by Democrats, and entered the bets a few months ago when odds were at a much better price. If he wins, he estimates profits of as much as $30,000.
“这是一场数字游戏；你必须把情绪剥离出去，”波泽说，他是一本关于其预测市场策略的自出版书籍的作者。波泽基于在华尔街技术系统领域的职业生涯，建立了一个用于交易这些市场的量化模型。
"It's a numbers game; you have to strip your emotions out of it," said Poser, the author of a self-published book about his prediction markets strategies. Poser built a quantitative model for trading these markets based on a career in Wall Street technology systems.
周二晚间，他不会孤军奋战。全美各地的人们正以创纪录的水平押注今年的中期选举竞争。
He will not be alone on Tuesday evening. Across the United States, people are betting on this year's midterm races at record levels for US election betting.
2024年，预测市场因在传统民意调查之外发出唐纳德·特朗普将赢得总统大选的信号而声名鹊起。这些平台允许交易者买卖各类竞选结果和变量的“是”或“否”合约，据平台和行业研究显示，押注中期选举的资金超过14亿美元。
Prediction markets rose to prominence in 2024 when they bucked traditional opinion polls in signaling that Donald Trump would win the presidency. The platforms allow traders to buy and sell "yes" or "no" contracts on an array of race outcomes and variables, and there is more than $1.4 billion wagered on the midterms, according to the platforms and industry research.
下注者中包括阿拉巴马州加登代尔的达里乌斯·甘布尔，51岁，他说自己在平台上押注已有两三个月，但单笔押注不会超过20美元。
Among those placing bets is Darius Gamble, 51, in Gardendale, Alabama, who said he has been betting on the platforms for two or three months but won't wager more than $20 on anything.
“这就是赌博，只是披着预测的外衣，”作为人力资源业务合作伙伴的甘布尔说，“它给你带来赌博的快感。”另一位押注金钱的希望者是佛罗里达州立大学22岁的学生亚丁·埃尔达尔。
"It is gambling, just disguised as predictions," said Gamble, who is a human resources business partner. "It gives you a gambling rush."
尽管他预计民主党将大获全胜，埃达尔却选择了一种反向策略，押注在他分析中共和党候选人获胜几率“严重被低估”的选战。“你可以在佛罗里达州共和党获胜的押注上获得50%到55%的利润，”他在接受采访时表示。
Another hopeful with money on the line is Yadin Eldar, a 22-year-old student at Florida State University. While he anticipates large-scale Democratic victories, Eldar is opting for a contrarian strategy by placing bets on races where his analysis shows the odds of Republican candidates emerging victorious are "extremely underpriced."
尽管如此，押注选举依然让人压力巨大，埃达尔说，周二晚间他去参加一个无关的生日聚会时，可能会把自己的手机留在家里。
"You can make a 50-55% profit on Republicans winning in Florida," he said in an interview.
“这种情绪过山车极其危险，”他说。“对我从来没有好处。我会恐慌性抛售或恐慌性买入。”大型活动也在利用这种爆发式的兴趣。
Still, betting on elections is stressful, said Eldar, who may leave his own phone at home when he heads to an unrelated birthday party on Tuesday night. "The emotional roller coaster is extremely dangerous," he said. "It never does me any good.
10月，在纽约举行的一场名为NEXTPredict的聚会吸引了2000多名预测市场交易员、投资者和平台参与，现场座无虚席，会议安排了多场专门讨论选举合约的环节。
I panic sell or panic buy."
“氛围与2024年截然不同，那时预测市场还很新，属于初创阶段，”相邻市场联合创始人卢卡斯·科霍斯特说。该平台今夏融资250万美元，用于拓展其将合约聚合为可交易指数或基准的业务。
Large-scale events are also taking advantage of the exploding interest. A packed gathering of more than 2,000 prediction markets traders, investors and platforms in October in New York called NEXTPredict featured several sessions devoted to election contracts.
相邻市场的民主党政治期货指数在过去七天上涨了2.38%，而其共和党对应指数仅微涨0.14%。
"It's a very different vibe than we had in 2024, when prediction markets were really new and kind of upstarts," said Lucas Kohorst, co-founder of Adjacent Markets, a platform that this summer raised $2.5 million to help build out its business aggregating contracts into tradable indexes or benchmarks.
上周晚些时候，科霍斯特和他的团队决定从纽约飞往芝加哥，参加由卡尔希主办的选举前夜观赛派对。卡尔希是一家顶尖预测市场，与期权清算公司等金融市场老牌机构一起，作为白银级赞助商支持期货业协会的年会。“这一次，预测市场似乎已步入主流，”科霍斯特说。卡尔希未回应就该活动置评的请求。
Adjacent's Democrat Political Futures Index has climbed 2.38% in the last seven days, while its Republican counterpart has edged up 0.14%. Late last week, Kohorst and his team decided to fly from New York to Chicago to attend an election eve watch party hosted by Kalshi, a top prediction market that joined financial market stalwarts like the Options Clearing Corporation as a silver-level sponsor of the Futures Industry Association's annual conference. "This time, prediction markets seem to have joined the mainstream," Kohorst said. Kalshi did not respond to requests for comment on the event.
即便在拉斯维加斯——这个强烈反对此类平台的博彩业的精神家园——预测市场爱好者们也正抓住中期选举的契机，试图将赌徒的注意力从大道赌场里闪烁的老虎机和旋转的轮盘赌上吸引开来。
Even in Las Vegas, spiritual home to an industry that strongly opposes such platforms, prediction markets aficionados are seizing on the midterms as a way to distract gamblers from the blinking slot machines and spinning roulette wheels in the Strip's casinos.
彼得·克拉姆卡（Peter Klamka）押注选举将把他刚开业的“预测拉斯维加斯”（Prediction Vegas）酒吧变成一个热门新去处，他正准备于周二晚间主办预测市场大会这一行业聚会。
Peter Klamka is wagering that the elections will transform his just-launched Prediction Vegas bar into a hot new destination, as he prepares to host the Prediction Markets Conference industry gathering on Tuesday evening.
“赌场不会播放选举，”克拉姆卡说。“从拉斯维加斯的角度来看，我就是（唯一的选择）。”内华达州对预测市场产品实施了严格限制。但克拉姆卡表示，他的许多外州客户在抵达前就已完成交易。
"No casinos will be showing elections," Klamka said. "From a Vegas standpoint, I'm it." Nevada has severely restricted prediction market offerings. But Klamka says many of his out-of-state clientele make their trades before arriving.
这正是“预测拉斯维加斯”大会组织者伊什·米利（Ish Milly）将选举派对视为故事仅仅一小部分的原因。
That's why Ish Milly, the organizer of the Vegas prediction markets conference, sees the election party as only one small part of the story.
“归根结底，我们更关注行业的长期发展和公信力，而非任何单次选举的结果，”他说。
"Ultimately, we're more interested in the long-term development and credibility of the industry than the outcome of any single election," he said.