What currency does Augur betting volume actually flow through?
If it's similar to what TruthCoin was proposing and REP only receives 0.5-1% of each bet then a BitUSD based version on BTS would be much more valuable. (Would you rather own REP that received 1% in fees from $1 Billion worth of betting or would you rather own the share through which all the betting volume was flowing?)
I have a feeling that having the trading volume coming into a 0% inflation share system starting from a low cap, while the product/service is in it's growth cycle (which could last years) is > than a lot/all of 1% transaction fees.
Example: Truthcoin is planning to let people bet in Bitcoin but charge 1% transaction fees which gets paid to Truthcoin holders.
But I'm wondering whether if they had $100 million in trading volume going into Truthcoin instead over the course of the year (which would start from a low market cap) how much of the $1 million in fees they were planning to charge they could offset?
If the betting volume flows through another currency other than REP then a BTS based fork, using BitUSD as the betting unit could potentially gain a much higher value with a fraction of the betting volume.
Similar to the BitAsset yield proposal, while the prediction market is in the growth phase, BTS could pay more to 'judges' and charge less than 1% because it is benefiting from BTS for BitUSD demand. (REP would receive $10 million from $1 Billion worth of betting if the betting volume flowed through another unit, while BTS (BitUSD) would receive the benefit of $1 billion in betting volume.)
REP currently values Augur at $180 million (Though it's probably over-valued due to small amount of IOU trading)
(Other thought: If Augur/Eth doesn't have a dollar stable currency yet, maybe we can offer Augur based PM's for BitUSD. Whoever becomes the de facto betting unit will probably benefit more than REP if REP isn't actually the betting unit.)