Emile Servan-Schreiber is doing a great job of putting prediction markets on the French media scene. (As I type this, he is on French TV.)
2 green-foot French economists (David Thesmar and Augustin Landier) are hyping the prediction markets in the French media, using a non-scientific language (“predictive markets”, “stocks” *) and few references to hard facts. Their background is not stellar. They penned an Op-Ed in July 2007, titled, “The mega-crash won’t happen” [PDF file].
Of course, one year later, the developed world experienced (and is still experiencing) the worst financial crisis ever. What’s funny is that, in 2007, our 2 economists-in-chief were hyping the non-regulated credit derivatives that sent us into the depression, and denying the possibility of systemic risk. What a bunch of incompetents.
Emile, please recruit more serious people.
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[*] The good vocabulary is “prediction markets”, and “traded bets” or “event derivatives”.
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