Should the Tories be doing much better in Wales?

Should the Tories be doing much better in Wales?

Does David Cameron’s appeal stop at Offa’s Dyke? Lots of excitement seems to have been generated over last night’s NOP poll on the Welsh Assembly elections – just under four weeks away. For the figures suggesting that the Tories could end in second place and become the main opposition party within the Assembly is being seen in some quarters as big news. But is this such a major development? Just looking at the numbers and comparisons with what happened four…

Read More Read More

BrandIndex betting to close at 4pm today

BrandIndex betting to close at 4pm today

IG Index have just called to say that because of the holiday weekend there will be no BrandIndex polling tomorrow so that this week’s market will close at 4pm today. The market will not operate, either, next week but will resume the week after. This means that this week’s figures will be based on four days polling and not five which could dilute any-pro-Blair Iran effect. Mike Smithson

Will Obama outspend Clinton in the primaries?

Will Obama outspend Clinton in the primaries?

Who’ll have most for February 5th 2008 “Super Duper Tuesday”? The big news in the 2008 White House race this week has been the announcements from the various camps about how successful they have been in fund-raising in the first quarter. Hillary Clinton kicked off earlier in the week with a statement from her campaign that a massive $26m had been raised from about 50,000 donors. The Obama camp waited a couple of days until last night when they announced…

Read More Read More

Will the freeing of the captives give a boost to Blair?

Will the freeing of the captives give a boost to Blair?

Could Labour be helped in the May elections? What’s the domestic political impact going to be from this afternoon’s news about the Iranian decision to free the fifteen captured British service men and women? After a crisis that looked as though it could have gone on and on this afternoon’s developments must be bringing a huge sigh of relief to the government and Tony Blair. For their continued detention provided an ongoing reminder of the policy that got the Royal…

Read More Read More

Polling analysis: Where Tony outpoints Dave

Polling analysis: Where Tony outpoints Dave

Is Blair set for a pre-exit polling renaissance? In the latest BrandIndex figures that are on the YouGov site Tony Blair is enjoying what equal his best figures yet since this data started coming out. Last week we commented that he had moved off the bottom level for the first time ever and the latest data shows that he is now 2.5% off the wooden spoon position. Added to that is the detailed data from the latest YouGov poll reproduced…

Read More Read More

Where’s the betting value in the French election?

Where’s the betting value in the French election?

Are Sarkozy backers right to be so confident? With just over two and a half weeks to go before the first round of voting in the French Presidential election betting opinion in the UK seems to be hardening behind the Right’s Nicolas Sarkozy. Almost everyday at the moment French journalists are contacting me about the UK betting interest in the fight and for them I have presented the chart showing changing sentiment in the betting in terms of implied probabilities…

Read More Read More

Politicians Popularity Betting: week to April 6th

Politicians Popularity Betting: week to April 6th

Steady as she goes This is an extremely tricky week for punting on the Index. It is the Parliamentary Easter recess, so there is little publicity for any but a few of the main players. Iran is dominating the news and it’s hard to see how that is going to play over the next seven days. Pensions are playing badly for Brown but a safe sell has been pre-empted by a sharp price adjustment by Anthony Wells, who stuck him…

Read More Read More

Has Murdoch’s flagship paper abandoned Gordon?

Has Murdoch’s flagship paper abandoned Gordon?

The Times steps up the pressure on the pension row One of the aspects of media behaviour that is hurting Gordon this morning is that newspapers never like to under-exaggerate the impact of their own scoops. So the Times follows it revelations on Saturday about the Chancellor ignoring the advice of civil servants in 1997 about the so-called “£5bn pensions grab” with today’s front-page splash, reproduced here, on the possible impact of its actions on the Labour succession. And as…

Read More Read More