Friday 5 June 2009

Big change on spreads

SportingIndex
CON 360-365 LAB 203-208 LD 53-56

But the TV "experts" project a Tory majority of just 4
A big gap has opened up this afternoon between the punters - those who back up their general election predictions with hard cash - and the TV academics who have been analysing the local election results.

So while SkyNews has been projecting, based on the handful of results in so far, a Conservative general election total 327 seats the Sporting Index spreads above have moved to 360 - 365, which is almost certainly the highest level since spread-betting of this kind started in the UK.

There's also been further movement in the Lib Dem spreads as gamblers see the greater potential for them following the decline of Labour.

So the SkyNews is talking about a Tory majority of just four seats - the mid-point betting prices suggest an overall majority of 75 seats.



I have to say that I simply do not get the SkyNew calculation given the drubbing that Labour has been getting up and down the country. And in any case local results, with the one exception on 1997, have been a pretty poor predictor of general election outcomes.


My sense is that the SPIN spreads, which are in response to market pressure (these things are not just invented by the bookies) are probably just on the high side - but that is all.

Clearly the local results have been affected by the concurrent Euro elections which have boosted the shares of the smaller parties - something that is much less likely to happen in a general election campaign.

Mike Smithson

57 comments:

Anonymous said...

I agree Mike, Labour are wounded, but Gordon is still in place, and possible replacements have chickened out. The council elections are looking good for the Tories so far. If the Euro election turns out okay for the Tories they will be more than content.

Andy said...

News from my county of Worcestershire: the Worcs CC site says 49 of 57 results are in, and so far it's Con 34 (+7), Lib Dem 8 (nc), Lab 3 (-8), Oth 4 (+1). The CC site is very slow, so details are hard to come by, but the Others seem to be two KHHC, one Residents Assn and (as if anyone doubted it!) Fran Oborski for the Liberals.

Vote share so far from the Worcs CC site: Con 43.0% (+3.1), Lib Dem 18.3% (-3.6), Lab 10.9% (-15.4), Others 27.9% (+16.0). Turnout 41.2%. The large Others contingent varies between KHHC, UKIP and Green, plus the odd Independent. Not the BNP, though, who don't seem to have done better than third anywhere - and then only in a three-candidate contest!

Still to declare are four two-member wards, two in Redditch and two in next-door Arrow Valley. Last time they produced six Lab and two Con, both Cons being in Redditch S, so the Labour vote share may tick up a bit, though I'd be surprised if the Tories didn't gain at least two of the six Labour-held seats. No inside info: just a hunch!

jsfl said...

News from the Shires

Con Gains:

Devon
Cornwall
Staffordshire

Labour also have definitely lost

Lancashire to NOC (still seats to be declared)
Derbyshire to NOC (still seats to be declared)

Labour are closed to being wiped out in

Hampshire (1 seat) Complete
Lincolnshire (2 seats)Complete
Bristol (2 seats) Complete
Kent (1 seat) so far - lost 7

Stuart Dickson said...

Compared with the start of the Euro campaign in mid-May, the main beneficiaries in the Line Betting market have been the SNP, Plaid Cymru and the DUP:

Betfair - Party Seats Line

Con 354 - 357
Lab 206 - 213
LD 51 - 56.5
SNP 15 - 19
PC 5 - 6
DUP 6 – 9.5

Anonymous said...

CON WIN
Derby
Lancashire!!

Friedrich said...

I would think the combined effect of the expenses scandal and the simultaneous Euro election is visible here. In a GE, the choice will boil down to Labour or Tories and that should carry Cameron to a decent majority easily. Hence the spreads.

The Labour result in terms of vote shares does not seem to be catastrophic enough to force Brown out and the loss of vital councils is perhaps not salient enough. So Brown might hang in there.

It is a bit as if the goal of the Labour Party were to combine the worst elements of the Thatcher putsch, the latter days of the Major government, and of IDS into a single electoral disaster. It is an achievement of kinds.

Friedrich said...

Geoff Hoon resigns.

Anonymous said...

Mike, any timeline on website working again?

Anonymous said...

Worth getting the 2010 election price - extreme value with 2009 election now odds on.

Anonymous said...

It's weird - I've been getting the new updates on my RSS thingamajig - but the main site is still saying it's April. Does anyone know what's going on?

Andy said...

Worcestershire update: the Tories actually gained all the six Labour seats in the Arrow Valley/Redditch wards, so Labour are reduced to a rump of just three seats.

Final results, courtesy of Worcs County Council's website:

Con: 42 (+13), share 42.7% (+2.8)
Lib Dem: 8 (nc), share 18.3% (-3.6)
Lab 3: (-14), share 13.4% (-12.9)
Others 4: (+1) share 25.5% (+13.6)

Sunil Prasannan said...

Beckett resigns from Govt. too, according to Sky website.

Sunil Prasannan said...

Also Ian Gibson resigns his Norwich North seat to force a by-election.

maximum nosher said...

Agree with anon at 1607 - Main pb.com is stuck on 25th April 2009 page for some reason - I'm missing out!!

Sunil Prasannan said...

Sky saying McNulty too!

Tory Boy said...

Caroline Flint has just quit too according to Sky News.

Simon said...

Main site just fallen over - just as Flint quits government

She now looks very, very foolish

Tory Boy said...

Hmmm main site just fallen over? I haven't been able to see the site all day. It's showing cached posts from April 25th.

Simon said...

Glenys Kinnock to become new Minister for Europe

how anti-democratic can this f*ckwit get

Simon said...

the House of Lords is not the place for government ministers

Brown has just kicked the entire PLP in the balls

alex said...

Glenys Kinnock was just too much for the site to take i'm afraid.

alex said...

The American system has separation of powers and unelected ministers because the President is elected with a personal mandate.

Gordon Brown is unelected and is making a mockery of our constitutional arrangements.

"Democratic Renewal Council" - does he realise how ridiculous that sounds?

Anonymous said...

Good thread and more than relaxed to comment more fully on here.
Look ! The levels of the Parties are predicated on whether or not Labour can winkle GB out of office.

Whilst he remains Labour are headed for electoral oblivion but if he is replaced there is a window wherein Labour's fortunes might recover dramatically, albeit briefly.

URW

Tory Boy said...

Gordon Brown is now trading at 2.10to be ousted as prime minster this month again. That price moved out to 4.80 during the press conference. It collapsed as soon as Flint's resignation was announced.

I personally think Flint looks foolish and selfish now and will cause little damage to Brown. He has the big hitters all supporting him and his party knows if he quits an early election is a foregone conclusion.

Anonymous said...

Can someone tell us whats going on with the main site. All I can get is April 25th

Alexander C. Fisher said...

Can someone help me? The main site is showing only cached pages from April for me, but I've checked on my iPhone and others seem to be getting through....

jsfl said...

Mike Smithson / Morus:

Please can you put a notice up about what is wrong with the main site.

Everyone is going through Cold Turkey not having access to the site and not knowing what the situation is on possibly what is the most incredible day politically in decades.

Ave it 09 said...

Let's all laugh at Labour!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

jsfl said...

Ave it 09!:

Too right!

I hear the World Wildlife Fund is calling for the Southern Labour County Councillor to be declared and endangered species.

South of the London/M4 line there are now only 18 in existence. A very rare breed indeed (there were 21 alone in Kent yesterday).

Anonymous said...

Monster Raving Loony beats two Labour candidates.
Seems reasonable.

http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/cn_news_home/DisplayArticle.asp?ID=423173

b.

Henry W said...

I can't take this Mr Smithson as a lurker I have rights you know,when will the main site be back please as I am getting withdrawal symptoms.

jsfl said...

Labour will lose over 300 seats

Conservatives will gain around 275 seats

loadofoldstodge said...

Evening all :)

Another frenetic and fascinating day. A poor set of results frnakly for the LDs mitigated only by the capture of Bristol and a respectable vote share.

The loss of Somerset was predictable, that of Devon less so while I called Cornwall a couple of days ago.

I saw some of the Surrey count. The Tories lost seats in Elmbridge to Independents and one in Ashtead which had been a traditionally independent stronghold. LD gains in Spelthorne, Woking and Tandridge were offset by a couple of losses in Guildford.

The Conservatives finished down a net 3 seats while the LDs made a net gain of 1 and the Independents also gained 3. Labour lost 1 but surprisingly held their Stanwell seat.

Scipio said...

For those unable to connect via the usual web address try

http://87.106.214.196/

worked for me

Anonymous said...

What is happening to the main site? I just get the "April" stuff or a blank screen! I've tried logging on from other sites and still just get the blank screen. I'm really disappointed especially as it is such a momentous day in Politics!!

Anonymous said...

Thanks Scipio for that. Got the main site but only getting a blank screen when I click on the comments!! WTF is going on???

jsfl said...

Evening All again,

Extrapolating the Sky summary figures to include Suffolk.

Con 275
Lab -322
LD -44

Only Shropshire to be declared

Currently:

Con 23
LD 6
Lab 1
Ind 1

This is worse than Gordon's worst nighmare

Scipio said...

Your not going to like this much but any page can be accessed clicking on the link you want and replacing
politicalbetting.com
with
87.106.214.196
in the full web address.

Its a bit of work navigating like that but it can be done.

Anonymous said...

I still can't get in to the main site. Get the home page but when I try and enter a thread the screen goes blank

Henry W said...

Thanks it's a dns problem,I resolved it by using the ip address instead of politicbetting.com then when I got the white page replaced name with ip address,thank you Scipio sir

Anonymous said...

regardless of the Devon and Someset, the Lib Dems will sense they are onto something in the north and in the cities. I predict more joy for them on Sunday night.

Anonymous said...

Can get the current page by entering 87.106.214.196 but only a blank page when I try to view comments.

Any help would be appreciated

Ave it 09 said...

Really bad time for pb.com to be down.

And its happened before at busy times!

Will I have to rely on guido for GE2009/2010?

Ave it 09 said...

Good analysis just now on sky.

Important to reflect the boundary changes in the presentation of it.

Except maj would really be nearer 100 on

Scipio said...

Anonymous at 21:03

See my comment at 20:35

Once you have a comment page, submit a comment. That seems to cure the problem on the PC you submit the comment from. Not sure I understand that, some local dns caching I guess, but there you go,

Henry W said...

anon
Use 87.106.214.196 to get the main page then copy 87.106.214.196 then goto the comments you will get the white page look at the address and it will be http://politicalbetting.com/etc delete http:// politicalbetting.com and replace with http://87.106.214.196/etc this will resolve the comments page and if you want to look at old comments just click on old comments and do the same it is working for me

Henry W said...

Thank you Scipio sir will test it now

Henry W said...

Works for me

Ave it 09 said...

Scipio/Henry - thanks

See you on channel 1!!!

Anonymous said...

Tried to get pb1 on another pc don't you end up going back to the april page

Anonymous said...

ditto..been locked out all day, cannot get in, checked with my broadband supplier, they say its possibly a dns attack.
I don't think I will have missed Tim's smears anyway, will try tomorrow

MTF

Anonymous said...

Scipio,

Thanks a lot. It worked.

Anonymous said...

Morning,everybody peeps.

This is just about the most un-user friendly site on the web...but I like it !
Much better to write something virtually noone else will ever read.
The betting narrative looks complicated but really is easy-peasy to follow.What youneed to know is that serious Tory Backers are petrified of Labour changing leaders because they know that that will make a huge dent in their notional profits AT THE TIME even though it might not affect the final result by that much.
Yesterday's results indicate (to me anyway) a Tory landslide with the Lib Dems struggling to hold their 62 Seats.
What is even more starkly written is the Labour wipeout because EVERYONE will take a bite from them.
My tip of the day is NOM at 2-5 with W.HILL.This is a cumbersome bet because it encompasses a LAB Overall.Nonetheless it is outstanding value.

URW

Anonymous said...

To clarify, I am saying that there WILL be an Overall Majority and 2-5 is a great price.

URW

Anonymous said...

still unable to enter comments as screen just goes blank. If I then enter 87.106.214.196 again I simply get back to the title page.
What am I doing wrong

Anonymous said...

is the main site down again as when i click on my favourite link i get a thread up from april

Henry W said...

Same for me but now back on see Scipio or my added bits it does work