Throw a bunch of stockbrokers together and soon enough they will end up making bets. Find ones who specialize in Russian equities, and their party games turn into a "futures market" on the outcome of the upcoming parliamentary elections.
As election day approaches, a group of about 30 brokers and fund managers who invest in Russia are laying aside their million-dollar bids on blue-chips to trade in the percentage of votes major political parties are likely to win on Dec. 17.
And while their informal market more or less agrees with polls saying the Communists will gain a healthy number of seats, that party is trading down, while the government-backed Our Home Is Russia is on an upswing.
"I would say we'll probably predict this pretty well," said Brom Keifetz, a London-based investor, whom many credit as the ringleader in the Russian elections market.
The market was sparked in the summer, when most closely watched election races since the fall of the Iron Curtain was born.
"It was all sort of organic," said Keifetz. "Everybody had been paying attention to the elections, there was all this polling data, so I thought, 'Let's see if we can make a market in this thing.''
The Communist Party began strong at 33 percent, when quotes were first made at the beginning of October, but is now on a downward slide, trading around 17. Our Home started climbing recently from its first quote of 7 percent, and is now hovering at 11 percent, according to another market participant.
"It picked up steam lately on the heels of the publicity campaign," said Peter Kizenko, chief of trading at Alliance Menatep, a Moscow brokerage.
"A lot of fund managers come through Moscow, and they started seeing all this publicity, and they've been buying over the last week," he said, as though analyzing any financial market in the world.
Kizenko has made a market for Our Home at 9 bid, 11 offer. For the uninitiated, this means he is willing to buy the chance that the party will receive at least 9 percent of the vote but less than 11 percent. Those who believe Our Home will receive more than 11 percent would make one or more contracts with him by buying his "11s." If Our Home comes in with 15 percent, that person pockets the difference, or $1 per percentage point, multiplied by the number of contracts. Twenty-five contracts in this case pays off $100.
As with Russia's real stock market, not all issues are actively traded.
Only five of the 43 parties competing in the December polls -- the Communists, Our Home, Yabloko, the Congress of Russian Communities and the don't-take-us-too-seriously Beer Lovers -- are regularly quoted by the brokers, although others crop up from time to time. The Beer Lovers party has remained flat at 1 percent, well short of the 5 percent threshold required for seats in the State Duma.
While the Russia players emphasized that betting is done strictly for fun, some believe the free market to be a more accurate indicator of election results than conventional polling data.
At the University of Iowa's College of Business, the on-line Iowa Electronic Market allows some 5,000 traders to trade mainly on U.S. political events.
"Instead of trading May wheat, we trade November Clinton," said Professor Joyce Berg, an associate professor at the college, who uses the market for teaching purposes.
Berg said that in the 1988 and 1992 U.S. presidential elections, the market predicted the results with greater accuracy than even election-eve polls.
"When people have to put their money where their mouths are, they behave differently," she said by telephone from Iowa City. "If I had to put my money on these [Russia watchers], I think I would."
Clearly, this nascent Russian market is hardly comparable to the Iowa example, and nobody is taking the predictions very seriously.
"I want to make the point that this is for fun, among friends who are gamblers and traders," said Keifetz, who played the horses professionally in New York for seven years before earning a business degree. An individual will typically hold about 20 contracts, he said, making a single "position" worth $20.
Nor is any of this unique to Russia, or to politics. Markets are made around the world in a variety of subjects. Sporting pools are particularly popular in the West. A more grisly U.S. pastime involves "ghoul pools," in which participants bet on famous people likely to die in the coming year.
In Russia, the legislative elections are not alone in the game. One Moscow broker is playing a market for January inflation in Russia -- predicting 6.75 percent -- and the presidential elections are likely to generate even more interest.
"The presidential election is definitely going to be a big market," said Nicholas Mokhoff, a Moscow-based equities trader with Hermes Capital Management. But, he said, U.S. college basketball remained more of a lure: "I'm more heavily involved in the NCAA."
As election day approaches, a group of about 30 brokers and fund managers who invest in Russia are laying aside their million-dollar bids on blue-chips to trade in the percentage of votes major political parties are likely to win on Dec. 17.
And while their informal market more or less agrees with polls saying the Communists will gain a healthy number of seats, that party is trading down, while the government-backed Our Home Is Russia is on an upswing.
"I would say we'll probably predict this pretty well," said Brom Keifetz, a London-based investor, whom many credit as the ringleader in the Russian elections market.
The market was sparked in the summer, when most closely watched election races since the fall of the Iron Curtain was born.
"It was all sort of organic," said Keifetz. "Everybody had been paying attention to the elections, there was all this polling data, so I thought, 'Let's see if we can make a market in this thing.''
The Communist Party began strong at 33 percent, when quotes were first made at the beginning of October, but is now on a downward slide, trading around 17. Our Home started climbing recently from its first quote of 7 percent, and is now hovering at 11 percent, according to another market participant.
"It picked up steam lately on the heels of the publicity campaign," said Peter Kizenko, chief of trading at Alliance Menatep, a Moscow brokerage.
"A lot of fund managers come through Moscow, and they started seeing all this publicity, and they've been buying over the last week," he said, as though analyzing any financial market in the world.
Kizenko has made a market for Our Home at 9 bid, 11 offer. For the uninitiated, this means he is willing to buy the chance that the party will receive at least 9 percent of the vote but less than 11 percent. Those who believe Our Home will receive more than 11 percent would make one or more contracts with him by buying his "11s." If Our Home comes in with 15 percent, that person pockets the difference, or $1 per percentage point, multiplied by the number of contracts. Twenty-five contracts in this case pays off $100.
As with Russia's real stock market, not all issues are actively traded.
Only five of the 43 parties competing in the December polls -- the Communists, Our Home, Yabloko, the Congress of Russian Communities and the don't-take-us-too-seriously Beer Lovers -- are regularly quoted by the brokers, although others crop up from time to time. The Beer Lovers party has remained flat at 1 percent, well short of the 5 percent threshold required for seats in the State Duma.
While the Russia players emphasized that betting is done strictly for fun, some believe the free market to be a more accurate indicator of election results than conventional polling data.
At the University of Iowa's College of Business, the on-line Iowa Electronic Market allows some 5,000 traders to trade mainly on U.S. political events.
"Instead of trading May wheat, we trade November Clinton," said Professor Joyce Berg, an associate professor at the college, who uses the market for teaching purposes.
Berg said that in the 1988 and 1992 U.S. presidential elections, the market predicted the results with greater accuracy than even election-eve polls.
"When people have to put their money where their mouths are, they behave differently," she said by telephone from Iowa City. "If I had to put my money on these [Russia watchers], I think I would."
Clearly, this nascent Russian market is hardly comparable to the Iowa example, and nobody is taking the predictions very seriously.
"I want to make the point that this is for fun, among friends who are gamblers and traders," said Keifetz, who played the horses professionally in New York for seven years before earning a business degree. An individual will typically hold about 20 contracts, he said, making a single "position" worth $20.
Nor is any of this unique to Russia, or to politics. Markets are made around the world in a variety of subjects. Sporting pools are particularly popular in the West. A more grisly U.S. pastime involves "ghoul pools," in which participants bet on famous people likely to die in the coming year.
In Russia, the legislative elections are not alone in the game. One Moscow broker is playing a market for January inflation in Russia -- predicting 6.75 percent -- and the presidential elections are likely to generate even more interest.
"The presidential election is definitely going to be a big market," said Nicholas Mokhoff, a Moscow-based equities trader with Hermes Capital Management. But, he said, U.S. college basketball remained more of a lure: "I'm more heavily involved in the NCAA."
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