Examining the Groyper Trade

Jul 27, 2026

Disclaimer: Some of this post focuses on current events — it’ll likely be outdated by the time you read this. Not meant to be investment advice.

One trading strategy involves finding election markets where people are emotionally overvaluing their favorite candidate.

In December, Ben Freeman posted one such potential opportunity involving Groyper-adjacent candidate James Fishback.

For the uninitiated, Groypers are typically defined as fans of Nick Fuentes, an alt-right internet personality. A typical Groyper is a young man who spends time posting frog memes, demanding nationalist policies, and pretending to be a pious Catholic.

There is significant demographic overlap between Groypers and Kalshi users, so it seemed plausible this group could be unintentionally inflating the odds of politicians who share their viewpoints.

I was already somewhat familiar with James Fishback due to his shenanigans in the finance industry.

After some additional research, I was convinced that Fishback had no realistic shot at winning the primary.

In December, I bought ~20k shares of Fishback ‘No’ at an average price of ¢85. With the election occurring on Aug 18th, a Fishback loss would equate to a decent gain. I thought he’d likely drop out before the election, further improving the time-adjusted return. I suspected his campaign was a PR stunt to raise money for Azoria Partners, the investment company he founded.

However, when Fishback left his investment company in January, I started questioning my thesis — maybe he was actually serious about staying in the race.

Then news dropped that Fishback’s couch was being repossessed. Without funds or somewhere to sit, surely a withdrawal was imminent?

via The New Republic https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/florida-gop-candidate-couch-repossessed-171921934.html

Fishback was also banned from Waffle House and IHOP. A campaign could perhaps sustain the loss of one breakfast establishment — but two??

Nevertheless, he persisted

In early June, I finally realized he wouldn’t drop out. His campaign became so cartoonishly racist that it’ll prevent him from getting a normal corporate job. Post-campaign, his best career opportunity is likely as a political ‘influencer’, so there’s incentive for him to keep campaigning and building a public profile.

I sold my Fisback ‘No’ shares in early June at ¢95. A good return, but not quite as good as I’d hoped.

Fast Forward

The race became interesting again when Jay Collins, a competing long-shot candidate, filed a lawsuit claiming Fishback was ineligible to become governor.

According to the Florida constitution, candidates must reside in Florida for the seven years preceding the election.

In 2020, Fishback registered and voted in Washington D.C. In 2021, he bought a D.C condo and claimed it as his primary address in mortgage documents. He also listed his D.C address on tax forms.

In court, he gave a litany of explanations. The condo was just for visits, he forgot to vote in Florida by mail, his accountants made a mistake, etc., etc.

I watched the hearing and didn’t find his defense particularly believable. There are just too many details placing him in D.C during that time period.

I’m no legal expert, but my guesstimate is that there’s around a 65% chance the judge disqualifies him from the election. The judge said that he’ll release his announcement by 5:00pm on the 27th.

Here are the potential ways I considered trading this event:

Buy Fishback ‘No’ shares - I did this, but it’s probably not the best trade as shares are already priced at ¢97.2. That would be a great risk and time adjusted return if the disqualification meant a Monday settlement. Unfortunately, an appeal would likely last until election day, so a disqualification won’t actually accelerate the return timeline.

Fishback Exact Place - This is an interesting market, but the the order seems relatively correct and the spreads are massive.

Fishback Vote Percentage - The ‘Fishback gets 1% of the vote’ market is the closest proxy to a ‘Fishback disqualified’ market.

No is trading at 62%, which is unfortunately pretty close to my estimate.

I do think the 20% and 30% NOs are probably undervalued, so I might buy all those (sorry readers).

Will Fishback Drop Out - This is a ‘fine print’ market. My reading is that if Fishback is legally disqualified and doesn’t appeal, that’ll count as dropping out. But if he is disqualified by the courts and does appeal, Kalshi won’t count that as dropping out. I think it’s likely that Fishback would appeal any ruling against him.

Kalshi doesn’t explicitly specify what happens if Fishback loses his appeal and doesn’t issue a withdrawal statement. I lean towards thinking that it won’t count as dropping out. There is also the possibility that the complete appeals process isn’t finished until after the election. For these reasons, I think ¢44 ‘No’ in this market is a better value than the comparable ‘Fishback gets 1% vote share’ market. I have a decent number of No shares here.

Jay Collins to get 2nd Place - This one confuses me a bit.

It initially looks to be a good value, because Jay Collins has a legitimate chance to get 2nd place even without considering a potential Fishback disqualification. With it factored in, it looks undervalued.

But this line strikes fear in my heart: ‘Candidates who withdraw or are disqualified after the filing deadline but remain on the ballot are ranked based on votes received’.

My interpretation is that Kalshi would still count votes for Fishback even if he is officially disqualified by the state.

However, according to Florida law, election officials shouldn’t report votes for disqualified candidates. Disqualified votes are still part of the public record though, so those votes must be provided upon request.

If a Florida citizen requests a count of the disqualified votes, would Kalshi consider those for settlement purposes? Perhaps. I’m not 100% sure. Either way, I’d rather trade the ‘drop out’ market because it seems to be a better value.