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Ballotcraft's Jiang on Creating a Fantasy Politics Game (Audio) · Bloomberg Intelligence

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  Speaker 1: Globoo Business News twenty four hours a day's Bloomberg dot
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  Speaker 1: This is a Bloomberg Business Flash from Bloomberg World Headquarters
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  Speaker 1: on Katherine Colderie. Economic concerns weighed on the stock market
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  Speaker 1: again today, dragging the SMP five hundred lower for the
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  Speaker 1: fourth session in five It was a benchmark's biggest back
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  Speaker 1: to back drop in almost three months. Bank shares were
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  Speaker 1: among the biggest losers for a second day, along with
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  Speaker 1: energy and raw material producers. We check the markets every
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  Speaker 1: fifteen minutes to down. Industrial l average fell one hundred
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  Speaker 1: points to day six tents of a percent. It closed
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  Speaker 1: at seventeen thousand, six hundred fifty one. SMP five hundred
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  Speaker 1: down twelve point six tents of a percent to close
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  Speaker 1: at two thousand fifty one. Then as to Act down
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  Speaker 1: thirty seven points eight tens of a percent, closing at
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  Speaker 1: forty seven twenty five. West Texas Intermedia crude oil up
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  Speaker 1: twenty two cents a barrel to forty three eighty seven.
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  Speaker 1: Spout goal down ten dollar thirty cents ounce at twelve
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  Speaker 1: eighty one. Fifty ten year treasury up seven thirty seconds
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  Speaker 1: with the yield of one point seven seven and that's
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  Speaker 1: a Bloomberg business flash, Thank you very much, Katherine Cowdery.
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  Speaker 1: Just a recap of some of the earnings are being
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  Speaker 1: released after the close of trading today, craft Heins are
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  Speaker 1: reporting quarterly results seventy three cents a share versus analysts
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  Speaker 1: estimates of sixty one cents to share. The shares of
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  Speaker 1: craft Heins moved higher by a six percent and after
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  Speaker 1: hours of trading. Also taking a look at the shares
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  Speaker 1: of Tesla, they reported a loss of fifty seven cents
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  Speaker 1: to share, but analyst estimates was for a loss of
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  Speaker 1: more sixty cents to share. The shares of Tesla are
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  Speaker 1: climbing five percent. Also, twenty first century Fox reported results
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  Speaker 1: and he said that they earned forty seven cents a
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  Speaker 1: share that matched analysts estimates, but the company also said
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  Speaker 1: that revenue was higher than previously estimated. It was up
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  Speaker 1: more than a billion billion dollars UH seven point to
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  Speaker 1: three billion versus seven point one nine a billion. The
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  Speaker 1: shares are moving higher by six percent. And finally, fit
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  Speaker 1: Bit Company reports EPs earners for share of ten cents
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  Speaker 1: versus analyst estimates of three cents. You think the shares
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  Speaker 1: would be moving higher, but the company issued week guidance
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  Speaker 1: for the second quarter, and the shares a fit Bit
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  Speaker 1: are down ten percent. And Fox, thank you for that
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  Speaker 1: masterful wrap of all these earnings coming in fast and
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  Speaker 1: furious after the bell. I wonder if someday our next
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  Speaker 1: guest will be listening to some report earnings for his
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  Speaker 1: company we shall see. Dennis J. Joins us now. He's
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  Speaker 1: a CEO and founder of a new, brand new baby
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  Speaker 1: company called ballot Craft. They have a fantasy politics game.
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  Speaker 1: That's what ballot Craft is. Think of fantasy football, fantasy baseball. Well,
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  Speaker 1: Dennis and his co founder have dived right in to
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  Speaker 1: do that. They are both Stanford grads, and of course
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  Speaker 1: I'm here at the Hoover Institute at Stanford University for
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  Speaker 1: John Taylor's Monetary policy conference tomorrow, which Dennis would know
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  Speaker 1: a lot about. He has a BA in Economics UH
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  Speaker 1: from Stanford University and MBA from M I. T. Sloan
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  Speaker 1: and he joins us now. Dennis, welcome, Thank you. So
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  Speaker 1: let's about ballot Craft. What is it? How do I
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  Speaker 1: play this game? Sure? So, if you're familiar with fantasy
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  Speaker 1: football or games like that, basically, we've we've taken that
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  Speaker 1: model and adapted for politics. UM. So what you can
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  Speaker 1: do is go into our site ballotcraft dot com and
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  Speaker 1: sign up and you can um. We have all these
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  Speaker 1: games going on for different contests that are coming up.
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  Speaker 1: So you could go Kentucky for instances voting soon, Oregan
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  Speaker 1: is voting soon, UM. And you can buy shares in
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  Speaker 1: different candidates. So you may think Bernie will win an
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  Speaker 1: Oregan or you think Hillary is gonna win Oregon. You
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  Speaker 1: can buy shares UM and there's certain price that that
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  Speaker 1: they sell at UM and that's roughly a prediction of
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  Speaker 1: kind of who's gonna win. So maybe um, Hillary is
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  Speaker 1: trading at in one state and you may think that's
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  Speaker 1: too high or too low UM, and so you you
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  Speaker 1: if you think it's too low, you buy shares in her,
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  Speaker 1: and you know, if if that turns out to be correct,
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  Speaker 1: then you win points on our game. So it's so
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  Speaker 1: it's all play money UM. But we have leaderboards, etcetera.
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  Speaker 1: For you know, so you can see who the best
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  Speaker 1: players are and over time and so so yeah, so
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  Speaker 1: that's that's that's basic concept. And we have games going
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  Speaker 1: for you know, all the primaries and also for other
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  Speaker 1: questions as well that are interesting too kind of our users. So,
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  Speaker 1: for instance, is the UK going to vote to leave
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  Speaker 1: the EU this summer? Is Mark Garland going to be
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  Speaker 1: confirmed for the Supreme Court by the end of Obama's term,
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  Speaker 1: things like that, and so that that's that's the basic
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  Speaker 1: gist of the game. Do you earn money as a
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  Speaker 1: participant if you win? No, you don't, So so it's
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  Speaker 1: all for for right now for play money and so
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  Speaker 1: so it's basically for bragging rights. Uh. And you can
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  Speaker 1: play with your friends, uh, set up leagues, private leagues,
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  Speaker 1: in the same way that you do it with fantasy football. Um,
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  Speaker 1: so do you make money? So so for us as
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  Speaker 1: a company, UM, what we're building is basically this this
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  Speaker 1: uh kind of the site for people who really like politics.
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  Speaker 1: And one thing that that that we've seen in the
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  Speaker 1: market is, um that political advertising is moving online in
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  Speaker 1: a really big way, uh in this cycle and cycle
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  Speaker 1: to come. So two years ago digital political advertising was
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  Speaker 1: les than a hundred million dollars and this year will
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  Speaker 1: be over a billion dollars. And so we are kind of, um,
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  Speaker 1: we're building We're building a site that kind of takes
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  Speaker 1: advantage of that going forward. Well, you know, I was
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  Speaker 1: at co Holt, the coffee house in trust your Union.
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  Speaker 1: Uh here at Trusted Maril Unions should say here at
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  Speaker 1: Stanford yesterday afternoon evening. I was working on some questions
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  Speaker 1: for a big interview that Pim and I have tomorrow.
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  Speaker 1: We're being Robert Capelan's president of Dallas FED. He's going
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  Speaker 1: to be here at John Taylor's conference. And it's just amazing.
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  Speaker 1: I overheard a couple of conversations someone who has started
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  Speaker 1: something and they were looking at some other start up
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  Speaker 1: they were going to use. And then a guy's walking
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  Speaker 1: by and say, oh, were you guys talking about? That's
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  Speaker 1: what Stanford's like? Now? Boy? Oh boy? I mean, so,
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  Speaker 1: how did you guys get go in this direction? Your
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  Speaker 1: you study economics, you're interested in tax policy and education,
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  Speaker 1: but you obviously want to make some money here. You're
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  Speaker 1: in a very competitive place with a lot of opportunity. Though,
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  Speaker 1: what gave you the idea this would work? Yeah? So,
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  Speaker 1: I I mean I think it actually dates back to
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  Speaker 1: my time at Stanford studying economics. Um so uh, you know,
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  Speaker 1: economists are are really fascinated with with these things called
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  Speaker 1: prediction markets, uh, and that that was true kind of
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  Speaker 1: when I was here, and it's been this long standing
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  Speaker 1: fascination and so um that that's that's kind of where
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  Speaker 1: the genesis was. But also thinking about so so I
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  Speaker 1: have a passion for politics as well, um and and
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  Speaker 1: we were thinking about how can we combine kind of
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  Speaker 1: so so, there's a big problem in the United States
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  Speaker 1: with kind of voter persupasion, you know, like it's low,
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  Speaker 1: and particularly among millennials um and there so there's there's
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  Speaker 1: people who care about politics. Is something that we care
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  Speaker 1: about deeply, and we were thinking, you know, how can
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  Speaker 1: we create something that you know, will encourage people to
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  Speaker 1: to be more interested in politics? Um And kind of
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  Speaker 1: we thought about fans football, how how what what impact
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  Speaker 1: that's had on football viewership? You know, it's it's made
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  Speaker 1: a lot of people who weren't fans before into fans.
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  Speaker 1: And so we thought, you know, what what if we
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  Speaker 1: kind of use that model and combined with kind of
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  Speaker 1: the prediction markets that I'm familiar with from a time here,
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  Speaker 1: um and create something that that's similarly compelling. Uh. And
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  Speaker 1: that's that's what we've done and and and that's the
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  Speaker 1: kind of feedback that we've gotten from a lot of users. So, um,
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  Speaker 1: we were very hardened by It's a user emailed us
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  Speaker 1: who's a teacher social stide, teacher junior high and he
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  Speaker 1: said he's using Ballotcraft with his students. You know, over
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  Speaker 1: seventy students playing ballotcraft and it's his way of kind
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  Speaker 1: of bringing to life the things that he's teaching in
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  Speaker 1: the classroom and so so yeah, so we've been very encouraged.
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  Speaker 1: But but I think so so they're kind of the
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  Speaker 1: two parts of two our um mission, you know, both
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  Speaker 1: you know, build this business and also to to build
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  Speaker 1: boost voter engagement. Thank you very much. Dennis Jiang, he
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  Speaker 1: is the chief executive and the founder of ballot Craft,
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  Speaker 1: joining us from Stanford University. You're listening to Taking Stockheim
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  Speaker 1: pim Fox My Coast Kathleen Hayes. This is Bloomberg Radio
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