Local and European elections betting update

It’s been pretty much one-way traffic in the European election betting, with everyone wanting to back UKIP to top the polls. We were 4/7 yesterday, but shortened that up to 1/2 overnight.

In the absence of any surprise polling results, I expect they will continue to shorten up as the media will probably focus on the probability of them winning during the next 24 hours. The casual punter who likes to occasionally dip his toe into betting on politics will almost certainly be wanting to back the favourite. It won’t be a good result for Ladbrokes.

I still hold out some hope that Labour will save our bacon. As Marcus Roberts said on PoliticalBetting yesterday, there are some good reasons to think they might outperform the polls. In particular, the unknown effect of An Independence From Europe being at the top of the ballot and Labour’s presumed organisational advantage on the day.

Elsewhere, there has been a bit of a move for Lutfur Rahman to be re-elected as Tower Hamlets mayor; his price has shortened from 7/4 to 5/4 in the last 24 hours. We’ve also seen some money for Merton council to remain in No Overall Control which is now 2/1 from 3/1. That would be quite disappointing for Labour, who really should be able to win this outright.

UPDATE:  This afternoon, we took the biggest bet we have fielded yet on YES in the Scottish Referendum, £5,000 at 3/1. That’s now 11/4 as a result. The bet was taken in one of our shops in Scotland. This will be a much bigger betting event than the Euros.