IEM Prospectus: 2004 Democratic National Convention Nomination Market
At 11:59am, Central Standard Time, Friday , February 21, 2003, the Iowa Electronic Market (IEM) will open trading in a market based on the Presidential nomination process of the 2004 Democratic National Convention. This document describes that market and should be viewed as a supplement to the Trader’s Manual. Except as specified in this prospectus, trading rules for this market are the same as those specified in the Trader’s Manual for the Iowa Electronic Market.
Contract liquidation values in this nomination market will be determined by the outcome of the 2004 Democratic National Convention. At market open, there are five contracts in this market representing five possible unique outcomes. Other contracts may be added to this market according to the contract spin-off procedure described below. The liquidation value of the contract which represents the actual outcome of the 2004 Democratic Convention will be $1.00. All other contracts will have a value of $0.00.
CONTRACTS
The financial contracts initially traded in this market are:
Code Contract Description CLIN_NOM $1.00 if Hillary Clinton wins the nomination; $0.00 otherwise GEPH_NOM $1.00 if Dick Gephardt wins the nomination; $0.00 otherwise KERR_NOM $1.00 if John Kerry wins the nomination; $0.00 otherwise LIEB_NOM $1.00 if Joe Lieberman wins the nomination; $0.00 otherwise ROF_NOM $1.00 if another candidate wins the nomination; $0.00 otherwise
ROF_NOM stands for “Democratic Convention Rest of Field” and represents all candidates not separately listed in this market.
As the 2004 Presidential campaign progresses, new candidate-specific contracts may be introduced as spinoffs of the ROF_NOM contract as described below. And, the order in which contracts appear on the trading screen may change. However, once a contract is listed it will remain active until after the convention when all contracts in the market are liquidated.
CONTRACT LIQUIDATION VALUES
This is a Winner-Takes-All market. The contract that denotes the actual outcome of the 2004 Democratic Convention will have a liquidation value of $1.00, all others will have values of $0.00.
The contract, CLIN_NOM, will be liquidated for $1.00 after the 2004 Democratic Convention if Hillary Clinton is elected by the convention delegates as the official Democratic nominee for the presidency. If she is not named as the Democratic candidate, the liquidation value of the CLIN_NOM contract will be $0.00. Similarly, other candidate-specific contracts will be liquidated for $1.00 or $0.00 depending upon whether or not the associated candidate becomes the Democratic Presidential nominee. The contract ROF_NOM will have a liquidation value of $1.00 if some candidate not listed in this market is the Democratic Convention nominee; its liquidation value will be $0.00 if one of the listed candidates is the nominee.
The New York Times will be the official source for nomination results.
Liquidation formulas can be viewed while you are logged into the IEM trading system by clicking on the market name, DConv04, at the upper righthand corner of the market window.
The judgment of the IEM Governors and Directors will be final in resolving questions of interpretation and typographical or clerical errors.
CONTRACT SPIN-OFFS
The Directors of the IEM reserve the right to introduce new contracts to the market as spin-offs of the ROF_NOM contract. When a contract spin-off occurs, each ROF_NOM contract will be replaced by two new contracts: a candidate-specific Democratic nominee contract and a new ROF_NOM contract. The new ROF_NOM contract will represent all remaining un-named Democratic candidates in the market.
No trader of pre-spinoff ROF_NOM contracts will be adversely affected. Traders will receive the same number of each of the new contracts as they held in the original contract, and the sum of the liquidation values of the new contracts will equal the liquidation value of the original contract. Because the value of the ROF_NOM contracts may change when new candidate-specific contracts are spun off, all outstanding ROF_NOM bids and asks will be canceled at the time of the spinoff.
Decisions to spin-off contracts will be based on the results of national polls addressing Democratic candidate choice. Polls sponsored by the following five newspapers will be used as our official sources: The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. When a candidate is chosen by 20% or more of the respondents in two consecutive polls listing all likely Democratic contenders, a candidate specific-contract for that candidate will be added to the market.
Spin-offs will be announced at least two days in advance. The new contract names, the specifications regarding liquidation values and the timing of the spin-off will be included in the announcement. This announcement will appear as an Announcement on your WebEx login screen.
CONTRACT BUNDLES
Fixed-price bundles consisting of one share of each of the contracts in this market can be purchased from or sold to the IEM system at any time. The price of each bundle is $1.00. Because only one official Democratic candidate will result from the convention process, the total payoff from holding a bundle consisting of one of each contract until the market closes is $1.00.
To buy or sell fixed-price bundles from the IEM exchange, use the “Market Orders” option from the trading Console. Select the option “DConv04 (buy at fixed price)” from the Market Orders list to buy bundles. Select the “DConv04 (sell at fixed price)” option to sell bundles. Purchases will be charged to your cash account and sales will be credited to your cash account.
Bundles consisting of one share of each of the contracts in this market may also be purchased and sold at current aggregate market prices rather than the fixed price of $1.00. To buy a market bundle at current ASK prices, use the “Market Order” option as above but select the option “DConv04 (buy at market prices)”. To sell a bundle at current BID prices, select the option “DConv04 (sell at market prices)”.
MARKET CLOSING
This market will close at 12:00PM, C.D.T. the day after the final Presidential nomination ballot at the convention. At that time, or as soon thereafter as results are available, liquidation values will be declared and funds credited to the cash accounts of market participants.
MARKET ACCESS
All current and newly enrolled IEM traders with US dollar denominated accounts will automatically be given trading rights in the 2004 Democratic National Convention Market. Access to the market is achieved by choosing DConv04 in the “Market Selection” pull-down menu on either the Login-Welcome screen or at the bottom of the Trading Screen.
Funds in a trader’s cash account are fungible across markets so new investment deposits are not required. Additional investments up to the maximum of $500 can be made at any time. New traders can open accounts using the IEM OnLine Account Application page at iemweb.biz.uiowa.edu/signup. There is a one-time account registration fee of $5.00, and investments are limited to the range of $5.00 to $500.
Requests to withdraw funds may be submitted at any time by completing the IEM’s Online Withdrawal Request form or by completing and mailing the paper version of the request form. Additional information about requesting withdrawals is available at tippie.uiowa.edu/accounts/withdrawals.html.
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