A former Conservative MP, senior Conservative aides and a Conservative member of the Welsh parliament have all been charged by the Gambling Commission with criminal cheating, after placing bets on the date of the general election with insider knowledgewww.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025…

— Adam Bienkov (@adambienkov.bsky.social) 2025-04-14T11:10:36.686Z

Whatever the outcome of the charges are I suspect this will have a profound impact on betting markets.

Perhaps I am being hopelessly naive but my expectation is that political insiders will no longer bet on politics because they risk bad publicity and worse, they just cannot take the risk. Having worked in a regulatory role one thing I will say is you cannot misunderestimate the stupidity and greed of some people to make money, ethics is a county in the East of England.

The result of that is political betting markets will lack any inside knowledge but allows perceptive punters like your esteemed editor and other PBers to make more of a profit.

TSE