SportingIndex cuts the UKIP spread again in effort to entice elusive purple buyers

SportingIndex cuts the UKIP spread again in effort to entice elusive purple buyers

Meanwhile the CON spread gets even closer to LAB

I’m just on the train back from London after having a fascinating chat with the guy who runs the political spread markets at Sporting Index. This is the form of betting that I like the most because it is all about numbers and the more you are right the more money you make. Unfortunately the converse is also the case!

Lots of interesting new markets are on the way and he’d be delighted to hear from PBers of any idea that they might have. I suggested LD deposit losses and his first question was how you’d go about working out an opening price.

On the main Commons seats spread featured above he said that the most striking feature was the almost total lack of UKIP buyers – hence today’s drop by one seat. He compared that with the Cleggasm surge ahead of GE2010 which fortunately for SPIN saw a rush to buy the LDs at a peak of more than 100 seats.

The essence of spread betting is that you buy or sell and your profits/losses are determined by the difference. Thus if you bought CON at today’s 285 level and they get 310 you’ll make 25 times your stage level. You can get out of a bet at almost any time and if you’ve made a profit you can pocket the difference.

But be warned. Spread betting can be very risky as I found to my cost on election day 2001.The messages were coming through that turnout was very much down and I interpreted that as being good for the Tories. This became my biggest ever betting loss.

Mike Smithson

2004-2014: The view from OUTSIDE the Westminster bubble


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