Insider trading opportunity?

[Slaughtermeyer]

I noticed the following post on DU discussing whether or not Al Gore would run for President:

He's not running and is not going to run
and he has no interest in running this time, although he has not ruled it out for the future. This information that I have comes firsthand. Of course I don't expect you to believe me as I can not offer proof, but take it from me we have to work with what we have this cycle.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discu...mesg_id=3557845

I wrote to him suggesting that he take advantage of his inside information by shorting Al Gore Democratic Party nomination contracts on Intrade, an Irish futures exchange that probably is exempt from US insider trading laws, and getting an over 90% annualized return on his investment. Here's the reply I got from him:

Interesting, but this is not possible for me to get involved in for 2 reasons. First I am too much of an insider, which leads to number 2. Since I am an attorney with a license to protect I could be engaging in insider trading and could put my license at risk. I have seen far too many attorneys around here get nailed for what they thought was 100% safe knowledge to trade on. Since my knowledge is more then speculation and based on direct conversation/contact, some of which is privileged I don't think I can get involved in this.

Thanks though

Joe Zodda

If anyone is interested in shorting the Al Gore contracts himself, there's more information about this available here:
http://www.tickerforum.org/cgi-ticke...-www?post=7322

[Wezil]

I'll trade you a set of Ottawa Lynx baseball cards.

How many Gore Credits can I get?

[Japher]

DU is full of wackos...

[VetLegion]

I'm not familiar with US law, but I think that trading on prediction markets is not regulated by the US SEC, so it would not be illegal for this guy to use his insider knowledge for personal gain.

[Wezil]

Yeah well, an anonymous poster well known for nutty 911 theories (no offence Mr. Slaughter, I'm sure you are perfectly sane in RL) comes along and invites us/me to invest in some scheme run out of Ireland based upon the anonymous postings of another anonymous poster from a site with dubious credibility. Let me think about this a minute....

[Slaughtermeyer]

Originally posted by Wezil
Yeah well, an anonymous poster well known for nutty 911 theories (no offence Mr. Slaughter, I'm sure you are perfectly sane in RL) comes along and invites us/me to invest in some scheme run out of Ireland based upon the anonymous postings of another anonymous poster from a site with dubious credibility. Let me think about this a minute....

I did check the internet and found that there is a real Zodda law firm.

[Wezil]

Originally posted by Slaughtermeyer


I did check the internet and found that there is a real Zodda law firm.

Oh! In that case, ask Wiglaf for his credit card. I'm in.

[DanS]

I used to wonder how the Nigerian 419 scams made any money...

[Aeson]

Intrade seems legit. Yahoo tracks them.

[Slaughtermeyer]

RealClearPolitics.com uses their figures too. Look at the "Intrade Real Time Quotes" section above the graph.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/us/democratic_presidential_nomination-191.html

[Arrian]

Imagine for a moment that you act on this, and it's a good tip and you make money.

You have documented your insider trading online. Well done! Well done indeed!

-Arrian

[Slaughtermeyer]

I don't think US insider trading laws apply to exchanges in Ireland where Intrade operates.

[Zkribbler]

Gore has already stated this, very publically, very often.
So this ain't insider trading. It's common knowledge.

[Arrian]

Originally posted by Slaughtermeyer
I don't think US insider trading laws apply to exchanges in Ireland where Intrade operates.

And Ireland doesn't have insider trading laws?

-Arrian

[Dauphin]

It's not exactly insider trading as the information provided is clearly public and not substantiated.

Market manipulation on the other hand...