If you last tuned into the Democratic Primary race a month or so ago, you are probably expecting former Vice President Joe Biden to be leading. Ah, how fast things can change in the political world.
As of Thursday, Feb. 20, Bernie Sanders is the current favorite in the betting market to win the nomination with +117 average odds (bet $100 to win $117) across four non-U.S. books — which comes out to an average implied probability of 46.0%.
Biden isn't even in second place to Sanders; in fact, he's fourth right now behind Michael Bloomberg (19.0% probability, +426 average odds) and Pete Buttigieg (11.7% probability, +755 average odds). Biden currently sits in single digits (9.5% probability, +953 average odds), as do Elizabeth Warren, Amy Klobuchar, Tulsi Gabbard and Tom Steyer.
See the full odds below.
(Note: Odds via Betfair; more odds are farther down the page. Implied probabilities are juice-free.)
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2020 Democratic Primary Betting Odds
- Bernie Sanders: +100, 45.0% implied probability
- Michael Bloomberg: +350, 20.0% implied probability
- Pete Buttigieg: +600, 12.9% implied probability
- Joe Biden: +900, 9.0% implied probability
- Hillary Clinton: +2200, 3.9% implied probability
- Elizabeth Warren: +2500, 3.4% implied probability
- Amy Klobuchar: +2500, 3.4% implied probability
- Michelle Obama: +10000, 0.9% implied probability
- Tulsi Gabbard: +15000, 0.6% implied probability
- Deval Patrick: +15000, 0.6% implied probability
- Tom Steyer: +30000, 0.3% implied probability
The next state to vote is Nevada, which will occur this Saturday, Feb. 22. Betfair currently has Sanders as a massive -800 favorite to win the state, which translates to a 88.9% implied probability without removing juice.
Next up after that is South Carolina, and then Super Tuesday — the day with the most states voting at once; 34% of the delegates will be granted then — on Tuesday, March 3.
The biggest surprise of late has been former NYC mayor Michael Bloomberg, who entered the race late and has not even been on the ballots in the first two states to vote. He's making a big play for Super Tuesday.
Wednesday night's debate in Nevada was the first for Bloomberg, and according to the betting market, it didn't go well for him. He was approaching Sanders in odds and got up even to around 2/1, but now he's back down around 4/1 given his implied probability of 19.0%.
These odds are obviously correlated: Biden falling down over the last month has meant surges for Buttigieg, Bloomberg, Sanders and likely Klobuchar. If he continues to drop and underperforms in South Carolina — which would be a bad sign for the former VP given his African American support — it will be interesting to see where his moderate support goes.
The U.S. politics website 538 has a model to predict the Democratic Primary winner, and while Sanders is in the lead among candidates at 34% to gain a majority, they actually have the most likely outcome (41%) as a brokered convention, which means no candidate was able to get a majority of votes. Ladbrokes, another European book, has that outcome at a 50.0% implied probability. Sanders is at a 52% probability at 538 to win the nomination.
Here are the full odds and juice-free probabilities for candidates across four non-U.S. books.
