The team at iPredict are sad to announce that due to regulatory hurdles we must suspend operations in New Zealand. The full text is [url=/app.php?do=message]here[/url] and pasted below: ---------- Over the past seven years, the team at Victoria Link have been running New Zealand's only prediction market, iPredict. It is one of only three "commercial" prediction markets operating globally. We've really enjoyed turning it from research into a practical tool which has become part of the New Zealand political narrative. Prediction markets function based on the assumption that people will be more accurate when they back their opinion with money. There is a wide academic field studying this, and it could one day result in more accurate forecasting of a huge variety of events and even change how governments make decisions. As prediction markets do not comfortably fit within any existing regulatory boxes, we have been working closely and positively with the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) to enable us to operate economically within the financial market regulations. Regrettably the Ministry of Justice has not been so positive. We applied for an exemption from the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act. We believed we would secure an exemption due to the limited possible investment into iPredict trades and the small nature of the Prediction market transactions. Our application has been declined by the Minister, Simon Bridges, on the grounds that we are "a legitimate money laundering risk". This is essentially because we have no customer due diligence checks. He considered the level of regulatory burden is proportionate to the risk. He formed these views without any discussions with us. We are an academic not-for-profit organisation and our agreement with the FMA dictates we place caps on transactions. For example, over the past seven years, we have handled a total of 3,782 withdrawals, with an average trader net worth of $41. Our withdrawal process is lengthy and we are a low risk of money laundering. Because the cost of compliance is too high, we are forced to wind up operations in NZ. We are looking into the possibility of transferring our prediction activities to be included on PredictIt in the US, but this could take months to work through the regulatory requirements. From now on, we are unable to take further deposits, sign ups or place new prediction stocks. We will continue existing stocks and you can continue to trade them. We hope you will stay with us and transfer to PredictIt when we have the necessary approvals. However you may at any time sell down your stocks and withdraw your cash. All your funds are held in Prediction Clearing and these funds cover all our obligations. Anticipating higher than normal demands for withdrawals, our usual processing schedule will need to be suspended and withdrawals will be processed on a first come first served basis. As an alternative we would be delighted if you chose to donate your remaining funds to further the beneficial research Victoria University of Wellington is conducting into prediction markets, or education research at the university. It's been a whirlwind seven years, and we'd like to thank our fantastic community who have kept coming back to the site and our fantastic team who have managed and developed the site over the years. /forum/read.php?1,34732,34732#msg-34732 Fri, 06 May 2016 09:34:11 +1200 Phorum 5.2.10 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34933#msg-34933 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34933#msg-34933 WSP Announcements Thu, 05 May 2016 18:04:06 +1200 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34932#msg-34932 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34932#msg-34932 EyeSack Announcements Thu, 05 May 2016 10:43:48 +1200 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34929#msg-34929 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34929#msg-34929 MaxTheCreator Announcements Sat, 23 Apr 2016 23:51:39 +1200 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34914#msg-34914 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34914#msg-34914 www.stuff.co.nz]

Do you think the FMA will pull the finger out from their rear-ends and investigate, or do they only investigate firms with total revenue of $300 000?]]> TraderV Announcements Sat, 05 Mar 2016 13:38:30 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34848#msg-34848 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34848#msg-34848 rene_lp Announcements Thu, 14 Jan 2016 04:18:15 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34843#msg-34843 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34843#msg-34843 jacksparrow Announcements Mon, 11 Jan 2016 00:07:18 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34831#msg-34831 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34831#msg-34831
I think you can remove the tinfoil hat! (I was always keen for a stock on tinfoil hat sales)

I saw it reported (maybe stuff.co.nz), that over the history of iPredict there were something like three people who had multiple accounts. Two of those were a genuine mistake and the other case the user was notified as to the rule breach.

As for conspiracy related to trading of Hooton, Whaleoil et al.
I'm sure they were putting in their bus change and moving the market around on some stocks, and in a blatantly obious way given 5 minutes later there would be a partisan blog post/tweet saying 'look at iPredict'.

But that is and always was the whole point of the site. These tools have no divine right to see the future and other users were free to bet against (and indeed profit) from the foolishness of the predictions.]]> TraderV Announcements Mon, 04 Jan 2016 22:57:07 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34814#msg-34814 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34814#msg-34814
"There are multiple accounts held by some members on iPredict, and it would be embarrassing for management if these were wound back to be compliant with the very clear rules, being one account per individual or controlling persona".

While we're at it, how about some guidance on the expected date that a regular political summary of the site's findings will again be posted out to the media channels, and how impartial will that reporting be? i.e. whose impartial operation will be generating the report? Exceltium is not an acceptable answer.]]> jacksparrow Announcements Sun, 20 Dec 2015 13:15:55 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34794#msg-34794 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34794#msg-34794 However, PredictIt has a better platform for this and we are focusing our efforts to move the NZ contracts to that.

Thanks heaps for wanting to stick with us on this, we are working hard to find a solution.]]> admin Announcements Thu, 10 Dec 2015 09:29:54 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34790#msg-34790 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34790#msg-34790
So how about the suggestions of continuing the site, with the self-funding / restrictions on membership which would satisfy the govt's money-laundering concerns? I am sure most members would consider contributing a little bit more in fees so that the site could continue.

Please let us know if this is possible.

Thanks guys!]]> Spartan Announcements Mon, 07 Dec 2015 20:39:10 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34788#msg-34788 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34788#msg-34788
At this stage we are still closing contracts on their regular judgement dates. We are still looking into transferring your stocks to PredictIt, subject to the legalities and we will keep you posted on that front.

Admin]]> admin Announcements Mon, 07 Dec 2015 14:42:09 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34787#msg-34787 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34787#msg-34787
As for transparency, yes, sometimes bigger bets came in to swamp out someone's right-wing agenda. But when the reports were being done by Exceltium (Matthew Hooton) and political trades were obviously being tweaked just beforehand, that was far from transparent. These were also the sort of people who probably held more than one trading account, and Vic Link allowed that to continue, and they allowed a fox like Hooton to rule the henhouse. They're only backing away from the site because it's not meeting the preferred political end as well, anymore. Simon Bridges has helpfully provided an excuse to close it down.]]> jacksparrow Announcements Sun, 06 Dec 2015 09:28:41 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34786#msg-34786 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34786#msg-34786
I have loved the site. It has contributed to transparency in a way this little country desperately needs. It is a tragedy.]]> thedoctor Announcements Sun, 06 Dec 2015 09:01:47 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34785#msg-34785 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34785#msg-34785 DrPierreHazedoneas Announcements Sat, 05 Dec 2015 05:29:35 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34784#msg-34784 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34784#msg-34784
Thanks to the team at iPredict. It's been fun.]]> iprofit Announcements Fri, 04 Dec 2015 23:28:18 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34783#msg-34783 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34783#msg-34783 plutoman Announcements Fri, 04 Dec 2015 22:34:58 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34782#msg-34782 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34782#msg-34782 You can have only one account, that is the rule I obeyed anyway. But it now looks like iPredict staffers did no checking on new signups, instead hiding behind anonymous rules. A $20 per account fee to have more than one chance to play around, would be far too cheap for the political enthusiasts who have had a great time with the site over the years. I think that anyone who had multiple accounts should in fact be permanently banned from the site, then we'd see a real site running. Or, was that the whole point - was this a site to help market the National party and neoliberal policy from 2008 onwards, as Nicky Hager implied in his book, "Dirty Politics"?

And if this site is to keep running, be brave enough to publish a weekly closeoff from an impartial but named outfit, at a stated time, so the rest of us can check that the results haven't been fiddled with.]]> jacksparrow Announcements Fri, 04 Dec 2015 20:34:54 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34781#msg-34781 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34781#msg-34781 www.realme.govt.nz]]]> WSP Announcements Fri, 04 Dec 2015 17:36:20 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34779#msg-34779 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34779#msg-34779
Again my understanding was the NZ bank account could be closed immediately after the proof was given as far as IRD was concerned. So your credit card would be fine, once you have proved you had a NZ bank account.]]> LaxTrade Announcements Fri, 04 Dec 2015 10:13:43 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34778#msg-34778 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34778#msg-34778 ECrampton Announcements Fri, 04 Dec 2015 08:49:11 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34777#msg-34777 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34777#msg-34777
Dear Hon Simon Bridges,

I am writing to you to urge you to reconsider your decision to not allow iPredict an exemption to the anti-money law requirements.

The funds that are permitted to be deposited into iPredict to trade with, are such a small amount that one would have to have hundreds of accounts to move any meaningful amount of currency. This would not only be time consuming, but also very inefficient to establish this number of accounts to move any meaningful amount.

Instead of taking the easy way and forcing iPredict to close down, why not attempt to work with the Non-Profit, University run organsation and its members to come to a solution? The members are very passionate about iPredict and would be willing to make comprises in order to see the site continue.

Here are two simple steps suggested by a user of iPredict that could be implemented:

1) Each current / new member pays a one-off membership fee of (say) $20 to join. Users who opened multiple accounts would have to pay $20 for each account, which should discourage the practice. There would be a further fee of $5 per annum, deducted from each user's account at the start of each year. This money raised would allow iPredict to staff a "verification" service to oversee member details.

2) Only traders with a NZ-domiciled bank account are permitted to be members. NZ banks require new account-holders to provide full ID details. This would effectively eliminate the risk of money-laundering as the banks the account is with would have already done their due diligence.

I urge you to reconsider your decision as a heavy handed blanket approach never works and will only stifle innovation in the finance industry - an industry that is already extremely saddled with regulation, which as seen little to no innovation in the last 50 years. This strangle hold is now flowing over to a hobby industry that this regulation was never intended for.

Best Regards,

Robert Davey

Mt Maunganui

Concerned citizen who see the governments power is ever increasing to the detriment of our liberty.]]> top_shot Announcements Thu, 03 Dec 2015 14:27:03 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34775#msg-34775 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34775#msg-34775 ECrampton Announcements Thu, 03 Dec 2015 08:55:14 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34763#msg-34763 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34763#msg-34763
Just considering a possible solution to the problem:

1) Each current / new member pays a one-off membership fee of (say) $20 to join. Users who opened multiple accounts would have to pay $20 for each account, which should discourage the practice. There would be a further fee of $5 per annum, deducted from each user's account at the start of each year. This money raised would allow iPredict to staff a "verification" service to oversee member details.

2) Only traders with a NZ-domiciled bank account are permitted to be members. NZ banks require new account-holders to provide full ID details. This would effectively eliminate the risk of money-laundering.

Feedback and suggestions welcome.]]> Spartan Announcements Mon, 30 Nov 2015 12:46:38 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34754#msg-34754 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34754#msg-34754 -------------------------------------------------------
> Maybe issue one (just one) last, final contract:
> "Simon Bridges to develop raging hemorrhoids by 01
> Jan 2017"?


Could be a difficult one to verify.]]> maxb Announcements Sat, 28 Nov 2015 23:21:04 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34753#msg-34753 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34753#msg-34753 DrPierreHazedoneas Announcements Sat, 28 Nov 2015 16:36:05 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34749#msg-34749 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34749#msg-34749 ]]> rene_lp Announcements Fri, 27 Nov 2015 12:27:13 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34746#msg-34746 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34746#msg-34746 top_shot Announcements Thu, 26 Nov 2015 23:04:15 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34742#msg-34742 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34742#msg-34742
[en.wikipedia.org]]]> DrPierreHazedoneas Announcements Thu, 26 Nov 2015 15:07:54 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34741#msg-34741 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34741#msg-34741
This is unbelievable.]]> ECrampton Announcements Thu, 26 Nov 2015 14:36:05 +1300 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34739#msg-34739 /forum/read.php?1,34732,34739#msg-34739 maxb Announcements Thu, 26 Nov 2015 13:59:43 +1300