"After the votes were tallied on Election Day four years ago, the big winners turned out to be the betting Web sites that predicted George W. Bush's re-election.

U.K.-based Betfair correctly predicted that Bush would stay in office and gave him 2-to-1 odds of beating his Democratic rival, Sen. John Kerry. The odds at Dublin-based Tradesports.com were similarly accurate, giving Bush a 58 percent chance to win and Kerry a 42 percent chance.

This year, the predictions are far more dramatic. Betfair's national election chart puts the probability of a President Barack Obama at 94 percent and the probability of John McCain winning at just 7 percent. Obama's odds are up from below 90 percent last week. "

"What a change a few months make. In May, Obama and McCain were at rough parity. In mid-September, they were almost at parity--in other words, even odds--after Sarah Palin was nominated as the Republican vice presidential candidate. Then the odds of an Obama presidency broke sharply upward, roughly at the same time the financial crisis hit and the bailout bill was approved. "