politicalbetting.com

What do we mean by odds, percentages and the overround? To a betting man, the odds are everything. This may appear obvious but believe me it is often ignored in practice. I suspect this is because our grasp of odds, the implied percentages and our assessment of whether they offer value is somewhat intuitive. But try taking a more analytical approach and you may be surprised at what you find. Start with the simple match bet between two contestants of…

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What do we think of the internet politics TV channel? Tonight saw the launch of the new internet politics TV channel which has been funded by YouGov founder, Stefan Shakespeare and is being fronted by top-bloggers Iain Dale and Tim Montgomerie of ConservativeHome. The plan is to broadcast for four hours each evening and the channel has recruited a number of bloggers, including me, to provide occasional reports. The channel name comes from the address of the elegant terrace house…

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The dangers of making historical polling comparisons Like many polling nerds whenever I’ve wanted to check some past polling information I’ve gone to Mori’s “all firms” historical data tables. They are easily accessible and apparently comprehensive – except that Mori does not appear to recognise YouGov. But there’s a huge danger of using this source which I think is affecting current perceptions of Labour’s poll leads before they got into Government – many of the numbers in the Mori table…

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Will the market moves be reflected in post conference polls? The latest best price on Labour winning most seats at the next General Election has now eased to 6/4. The online bookmaker offering the odds, Corals, has also tightened the Tories to 1/2. So a winning £100 bet on Labour would produce a £150 profit while a Tory backer making a similar sized bet could only look forward to winnings of just £50. For the potential wininngs on the Tories…

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How the Parties Are Performing? None of the three main parties can take that much comfort from their performance in local by-elections since the start of July. In all contests during that period, the Conservatives have made a net loss of 1 seat, Labour are unchanged, the Liberal Democrats have made a net gain of 6, Scottish and Welsh nationalists have made a net gain of 2, and Others have made a net loss of 7. There have been a…

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In July we launched a competition on what Cameron would do in his speech to follow “hug a hoodie”. We asked what’s going to be next? Clearly it had to be something that was so distant from what you would expect to hear from a Tory leader that it will, at first, appear totally shocking. We’ve had three or four entrants making claims but I’ve decided to award the prize to David Herdson. His entry posted on July 23rrd was:-…

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It was good on the bulletins but did it fall flat in the hall? Having now watched all the TV bulletins it’s clear that like almost all Cameron’s set-pieces he gets his sound bites right. The speech has come over much better on the TV bulletins than it actually was. From what could be gathered from the TV bulletins you did not get the feeling of overwhelming support amongst the activists for their new leader and you could see that…

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How long a standing ovation will the new leader receive? Sir Menzies Campbell’s lasted five minutes, Tony Blair’s seven minutes, now spread betting firm IG Index has opened a market on how long a standing ovation David Cameron will receive after his closing speech tomorrow. The spread is between five-and-a-half and six minutes. By comparison last year when he was a leadership contender the standing ovation went on for three minutes. Then, of course, there weren’t the “floor managers assisting…

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