The Fundamental Disagreement

The fundamental disagreement centered on whether information that surfaces after a proposal is submitted should be accepted during a dispute.

Rejecting Information After Deadline

Several users argued that only the information available at the time a proposal is made should be valid in a dispute. Tyler, Aenews, and Jacob supported this view and pointed to the market rules to justify their position.

Accepting Information After Deadline

Fhantom and Dropper disagreed with this restriction. They argued that post-deadline information should be considered, especially when it helps clarify ambiguity that was unresolved at the time.

Thai Statement Impact

The debate was fundamentally about whether the Thai government statement, released after the market deadline, could be considered in the dispute. If information released after a market deadline was allowed, the Schelling point was effectively that the market would resolve to "Yes." However, if late information could not be used, the market would likely not resolve to "Yes," and the price would likely crash from 99¢ back down to its pre-statement level around 15¢.

Profit-Driven Incentives

With that context in mind, it's important to consider the financial incentives some users may have had in advocating for one outcome over the other.

Those who opposed using post-deadline information stood to benefit if the market did not resolve to "Yes," but their upside was relatively limited, mostly preserving or slightly growing their existing position.

By contrast, users who supported accepting post-deadline information may have built positions when "Yes" shares were trading at a steep discount. If the market resolved in their favor, their returns could have been several times their original investment. That gave them a much stronger incentive to promote the interpretation that favored a "Yes" resolution.

Most users who argued for a "No" resolution had likely been buyers between 40¢ and 90¢ for much of the market's duration. The argument against accepting post-deadline information only emerged in the final hours before the vote, meaning that for the vast majority of the market's existence, the consensus was overwhelmingly that the qualifying strikes were insufficient to resolve the market.

Summary

The core dispute was whether information that surfaces after a proposal is submitted should be considered in resolving a market. Some users insisted on sticking to the information available at the time of the proposal, while others argued for including later developments to clarify ambiguity. The Thai government statement became the focal point of this disagreement. Behind each stance were clear financial incentives, with much larger upside potential for those pushing for a "Yes" resolution.

Coming Up

Now that we've understood the main arguments from both sides and the core disagreement, let's take a moment to summarize the debate.