Have PBers been too good for them?

IG Index told me this morning that they were closing their BrandIndex spread market on the changing popularity of politicians which has been operation since January. Punters sought to guess whether a selection of politicians would go up or down and “buy” or “sell” accordingly.

The ratings were based on YouGov’s daily BrandIndex surveys of thousands of members of its pollution panel.

Each week for the site a little group led by Peter the Punter sought to work out what the best bets were and those who have followed the recommendations have turned a nice little profit. Thanks guys for all your work.

The problem from IG’s point of view was that most of the traffic was generated by this site. Efforts to get a national newspaper involved by publishing the ratings every week were not successful.

The market also required close management by the bookmaker because, unlike a betting exchange, the firm set the odds which needed constant monitoring.

Let’s hope that this venture resurfaces in some form because it was fun and for some quite profitable.

Mike Smithson