Do Labour figures show that the tide’s turned for Ken?

Do Labour figures show that the tide’s turned for Ken?

Were the results of a secret poll behind the Boris betting rush? Yesterday afternoon, while Labour was gathered in Birmingham for its spring conference, there was a big switch-over on the mayoral betting markets that now make Boris the odds-on favourite. For the talk at the conference was of Ken facing a major challenge suggesting to me that there might be another secret poll which they are keeping very quiet about. Tessa Jowell’s assertion that the “race this time is…

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Is Boris about to become favourite for Mayor?

Is Boris about to become favourite for Mayor?

As the chart, reflecting betting prices as implied probabilities, shows there has been an easing of Ken’s Mayoral election price and a tightening of Boris’s and most of this has happened in the past 36 hours. I don’t know what’s driving it. The last major news items were the opinion polls on Tuesday. On the Sporting Index spread market Boris has this morning been priced as the clear favourite. My only explanation is that Labour is holding its Spring Conference…

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Tories increase their YouGov lead by a point

Tories increase their YouGov lead by a point

But voters think the Speaker, Michael Martin, should resign The February survey by YouGov for the Daily Telegraph this morning suggests that public opinion is remaining pretty stable with hardly any movement on the last poll from the firm ten days ago. The figures with changes on the last survey from the poll ten days ago are: CON 40% (nc): LAB 33% (-1): LD 16% (nc) The figures mean that in every singly YouGov survey since Brown’s October U-turn over…

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Is this Hillary’s best ad so far?

Is this Hillary’s best ad so far?

But has it come too late? It has echoes, as one or two posters have suggested, of this brilliant ad by LBJ in 1964 when he was running against Barry Goldwater. UPDATE 1615 GMT. The Obama campaign have wasted no time in responding by getting this ad out – all within just over an hour. Democratic nomination betting is here. Mike Smithson

Is Cameron trying to do an Obama?

Is Cameron trying to do an Obama?

What do we think of their new £500k campaign? In almost all the national papers this morning there are large ads from the Conservatives which are aimed, it seems. at building up a supporter base rather than winning votes. There’s a different theme in every newspaper but the objective appears to be the same – “Join us at Conservatives.com”. The message in the Times is about economic competence, green issues get singled out for special attention in the Independent while…

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Peter Smith on an experiment for next Tuesday night

Peter Smith on an experiment for next Tuesday night

Elite Betting and the March 4th Primaries In an earlier thread I mentioned at Mike’s request some possible future PB activities but there was one fairly ambitious idea for which I did not have space. There is no doubt that this site has been a colossal success since it started in March 2004. There are many reasons and we could all list a number of ingredients – Mike, his open approach, the free and willing contributions by many talented and…

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What will the chart look like on Wednesday?

What will the chart look like on Wednesday?

Is Obama really home and dry? Just looking at the chart showing the changes in betting prices set out in terms of implied probabilities and you get a sense of this extraordinary race to be the Democratic standard bearer in the Presidential election on November 5th. But could there still be a sting in the tail? Could the Clintons stage one of their famous come-backs? Could the prospect of the first female president still be on? In Texas they have…

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Labour private poll: “Boris winning the 2nd prefs war”

Labour private poll: “Boris winning the 2nd prefs war”

The secret survey that shows Ken could be in trouble When on Tuesday Ken sought to counter the latest YouGov mayoral figures by revealing party private polling data he set off a disclosure process that has, for the first time I believe, allowed us to look at the full numbers from a Labour survey that was supposed to be secret. And with this election looking very tight a key factor will be how the second preferences split – will they…

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