The highest expected return bet I've seen in a while; How a Neighbors' Feud in Paradise Launched an International Rape Case; Susan is doing great; The family that votes together, stays together...

1) My aim with my daily e-mails is to educate, entertain, and enrich.

I think I've done a reasonably good job with the first two points, but not so much on the enriching front... though I'd give myself high marks for warning my readers away from overpriced stock promotions like electric-truck maker Nikola (NKLA) and plastics recycler Loop Industries (LOOP), as well as now-bankrupt German payments-processor Wirecard (WDI.DE) and car-rental company Hertz (HTZ).

In part, this is because we save our best stock ideas for our five paid newsletters: Empire Stock Investor, Empire Investment Report, Empire Elite Trader, Empire Elite Growth, and Empire SPAC Investor.

But today, I'm publicly sharing the highest expected return bet I've seen in a while – an opportunity to make 54% in six days...

Just buy Joe Biden to win the election at $0.65 cents "per share" (meaning real-money bettors give Biden a 65% chance of victory) on betting website PredictIt here.

There are only two possible outcomes: if Biden wins, you'll get paid $1 per share – a $0.35 (54%) profit – whereas if President Donald Trump wins, you'll lose all of your money.

(PredictIt only allows bets up to $850 for each of its "markets," but I've found seven other markets with similar odds (here, here, here, here, here, here, and here) that are directly or highly correlated with a Biden win, so you can bet as much as $6,800 if you wish.)

Why do I think this is a very high expected return bet? Because the model of FiveThirtyEight – a website I've been following for years, which I think is the best assessor of polls and odds anywhere (and which has made me a lot of money on PredictIt) – says that Biden is 89% likely to win (you can see the site's presidential forecast here).

This is a huge 24-percentage-point gap in your favor – one of the widest I've ever seen in the three elections I've been following on these two websites.

Don't believe FiveThirtyEight? Well, The Economist′s model gives Biden a 96% chance of winning. Or check out the Public Superforecasts site, which tracks the predictions of proven "Superforecasters," who give Biden an 85% chance of winning. (Here's a great book about it: Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction. The website also has lots of other interesting markets about the coronavirus and various economic measures.)

Or, if you want to make your own assessment of the odds based on the latest state and national polls, you can see them on the New York Times website here. Below are the results of the 17 national polls that were released yesterday and this morning:

(I hesitate to share this idea because I might anger Trump supporters. But to be clear: I'm not making a political statement about what I want to happen – this is merely my best, unemotional assessment of the odds. If the odds for the candidates were reversed, I'd be betting on Trump.)

2) I neglected to send out this story when it appeared on the front page of the New York Times in February...

It's one of the craziest I've ever read! I'm glad that Peter Nygard is finally being exposed as a sexual predator... How a Neighbors' Feud in Paradise Launched an International Rape Case. Excerpt:

The Bahamian pleasure palace featured a faux Mayan temple, sculptures of smoke-breathing snakes, and a disco with a stripper pole. The owner, Peter Nygard, a Canadian fashion executive, showed off his estate on TV shows like Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous and threw loud beachfront parties, reveling in the company of teenage girls and young women.

Next door, Louis Bacon, an American hedge fund billionaire, presided over an airy retreat with a lawn for croquet. Mr. Bacon preferred hunting alone with a bow and arrow to attending wild parties, and if mentioned at all in the press, was typically described as buttoned-up.

The neighbors had little in common except for extreme wealth and a driveway. But when Mr. Nygard wasn't allowed to rebuild after a fire, he blamed Mr. Bacon. Since then, the two have been embroiled in an epic battle, spending tens of millions of dollars and filing at least 25 lawsuits in five jurisdictions. Mr. Nygard, 78, has spread stories accusing Mr. Bacon of being an insider trader, murderer and member of the Ku Klux Klan. Mr. Bacon, 63, has accused Mr. Nygard of plotting to kill him.

The latest charge is particularly incendiary: Lawyers and investigators funded in part by Mr. Bacon claim that Mr. Nygard raped teenage girls in the Bahamas.

This month, a federal lawsuit was filed by separate lawyers in New York on behalf of 10 women accusing Mr. Nygard of sexual assault. The lawsuit claims that Mr. Nygard used his company, Nygard International, and employees to procure young victims and ply them with alcohol and drugs. He also paid Bahamian police officers to quash reports, shared women with local politicians and groomed victims to recruit "fresh meat," the lawsuit says. Through a spokesman, Mr. Nygard denied the allegations.

Over months of interviews with the New York Times, dozens of women and former employees described how alleged victims were lured to Mr. Nygard's Bahamian home by the prospect of modeling jobs or a taste of luxury.

"He preys on poor people's little girls," said Natasha Taylor, who worked there for five years.

But this is not just a story of abuse allegations. It's also a story about the lengths two rich men can go to in a small developing nation where the minimum wage is just $210 a week. Together, Mr. Nygard and Mr. Bacon are worth close to the annual budget of the government of the Bahamas, an archipelago off the coast of Florida with ritzy tourist resorts that belie the country's pockets of poverty.

3) After being hit by a bicycle in Central Park on Sunday and knocked unconscious with a concussion, my wife Susan is doing great. While she still has a few bruises and a little soreness in her back and neck, she's sleeping 12 hours a night and doesn't even have a headache!

We had a follow-up visit with Dr. Teena Shetty yesterday. She gave Susan a bunch of balance and cognitive tests and reviewed the results of the brain MRI Susan had on Monday. She was so pleased with Susan's progress that she loosened up the brain rest restrictions: Susan can now be on a screen (TV, phone, computer) for up to 20 minutes a handful of times each day. As you can imagine, Susan is delighted!

4) Susan was only a few blocks away from meeting us at the early voting site on 106th St. and Madison Ave. when the bike hit her on Sunday afternoon, so it wasn't until yesterday evening that we could all coordinate our schedules and vote. It was Katharine's first time (she turned 18 on May 29)! Here's a picture of us right afterward:

P.S. For those of you in New York City, there was no line whatsoever at our voting site at 7 p.m., but we've heard three-hour-plus horror stories on the Upper West Side and elsewhere (Mayor Bill de Blasio himself was caught in one such line!). To address this, the city has expanded the early voting hours to:

• Today: 10 a.m. – 6 p.m.
• Tomorrow and Saturday: 7 a.m. – 5 p.m.
• Sunday: 7 a.m. – 4 p.m. 

Or you can vote on election day from 6 a.m. – 9 p.m.

So there's no excuse for not voting!

Best regards,

Whitney