As the presidential election approaches, some College students are using online betting sites to profit from their political expertise.

Andy J. Frank ’05, president of the Harvard College Democrats, said he has been placing political bets on tradesports.com for over a year.

“It is fun because then you have a little more stake in it beyond just who is going to win,” Frank said. “It shows that you really believe what you’re saying.”

Frank is one of thousands of politically-charged bettors who flock to tradesports.com, a Dublin-based online trading exchange for economic, sporting and political events, to try their luck at predicting this year’s election.

“We will process about three million contracts this month,” Mike Knesevitch, spokesman for tradesports.com, said. “That’s a lot of trading.”

Knesevitch said that about 25 percent of the contracts—or bets—are political, and that many of those bettors are college students.

Associate Professor of Government Barry C. Burden said that these online betting markets are often a more accurate gauge of an election’s outcome than public opinion polls.

According to yesterday’s tradesports.com contract prices, Bush is beating Kerry 56 percent to 44 percent.

“The polls are more volatile. They respond to every event, every debate, every mistake made,” said Burden. “The monetary markets tend to be more stable.”.

Knesevitch said that this stability reflects the bettors’ concern for their money.

“Tradesports.com has over 40,000 members who put their money where their mouth is, and because of this, they educate themselves much more about the issues than others who don’t have that financial interest,” Knesevitch said.

Burden said he thinks the presidential primary campaign of Howard Dean, which relied heavily on the internet to garner youth support, has attracted a more diverse group of bettors.

“There may be a Republican bias because they have access to the internet and money to spend, but now that’s offset by the number of young liberals online,” he said.

Joshua A. Barro ’05, member of the Harvard Republican Club, said that he opened up an account with tradesports.com over the summer.

“I’m not that confident in my predictions,” Barro, who is currently at a loss of about $8, said. “It’s really more for fun than to get rich.”