(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
It's a view we all have to come to based on our own research but I think Hall was value when I laid Khan at 1.03 because her chances were always higher than 3%. That was just too low.
But even if her true chances were only, say, 15% then that made her value at that price.
You then have choices to trade or hold.
If the market moved in her direction based on turnout data, leaks and early results then, of course, you could then trade out at a profit.
If it looked like she'd run him even closer then you could hold it and trade out for an even higher price, or, once greened up, let it run all the way if you think there's a chance of a major upset.
If Sir Ed Davey manages to get NOM I’ll be very pleased.
Oh SKS is shite SED slightly less shite and a good LE2024 for him
I genuinely thought SED was a reference to the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands. I thought it was a bit strange, but "Sir Ed Davey" obviously hasn't really registered in my consciousness.
Same here, apart from the German thing. Until it was spelled out in a later post, I could not work out who was meant by SED. Now, the LibDems have gained a hatful of councillors so perhaps it does not matter, especially if they can regain third party status in the next House of Commons, but surely the party establishment must be looking around for its next star performer.
The third party has to have a leader with charisma. Kennedy had it, Ashdown had it, even Cable, Clegg and Farron had it a tiny bit. But Swinson and Davey not so much.
There’s an opportunity for the LibDems but I’m not convinced Davey is the one to exploit it fully.
Davey is not going to ever pull up any stumps in terms of charisma. It helps that he will be up against the wooden Starmer and petulant Sunak as comparators.
His target seat strategy is the correct position this GE, and focused on Tory held seats. He will have won if he puts LD back in 3rd place over SNP and gets more visibility next parliament, and the Jackpot if the balance of power in NOC.
NOC is unlikely but 3rd place is not.
The LDs had a good night, which prompts a long range betting tip for when individual GE seat markets go up. Have a look at my constituency, Tewkesbury. At first glance an LD victory looks unlikely but long-standing MP Laurence Robertson is retiring and the yellow peril has been advancing steadily in the area. The PC results showed strong yellow performances in the constituency (and also the Cotswolds, where Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown may also come under pressure.) Crucially, the LDs have now established themselves as the clear challengers so can legitimately campaign for Labour tactical votes. If they get that message across, they are in with a shout, and probably at decent odds.
Incidentally, the LDs just about swept the board in nearby Cheltenham. Local MP Alex Chalk looks to be done for, which is a pity. I think he is one of the best MPs in the House, regardless of Party.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Um hold on. A "value bet" is a bet made on the assumption that the odds will change in your favour. It becomes a "trading bet" if it is traded out before the results are known. If ridden all the way down to the result and it loses, then it becomes a "value loser". Or have I got this wrong?
A value bet/value loser is what I call a bet that loses when I don't want to admit I cocked up
Browsing the swings on council seats declared yesterday in the WM does show variable swings against Con in pretty much all seats in Wolverhampton, Walsall, Dudley and Solihull even if not many seats changed outside Dudley and swings less spectacular than elsewhere.
Unless there is some unusual split ticket voting (not impossible as that seems to have happened in Teesside) then Street may be too short at current odds.
Watching a series of clips on Politics Joe of (mainly) Richard Holden going round every news studio soiling himself.
I know you have to try and spin a poor result, but you can't go about in open denial looking like you are massively disconnected from both reality and sanity.
Browsing the swings on council seats declared yesterday in the WM does show variable swings against Con in pretty much all seats in Wolverhampton, Walsall, Dudley and Solihull even if not many seats changed outside Dudley and swings less spectacular than elsewhere.
Unless there is some unusual split ticket voting (not impossible as that seems to have happened in Teesside) then Street may be too short at current odds.
I covered my Street stake at over 3/1 with a Labour bet earlier so effectively all green.
Still expect him to win, though. "Gaza" may lose SKS two mayoralities, which is really Netanyahu because he never had a choice of the Corbyn/Gorgeous approach that would have retained all those votes.
If he had, he'd have had a crap locals and wouldn't be on the way to No 10.
If Sir Ed Davey manages to get NOM I’ll be very pleased.
Oh SKS is shite SED slightly less shite and a good LE2024 for him
I genuinely thought SED was a reference to the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands. I thought it was a bit strange, but "Sir Ed Davey" obviously hasn't really registered in my consciousness.
Same here, apart from the German thing. Until it was spelled out in a later post, I could not work out who was meant by SED. Now, the LibDems have gained a hatful of councillors so perhaps it does not matter, especially if they can regain third party status in the next House of Commons, but surely the party establishment must be looking around for its next star performer.
The third party has to have a leader with charisma. Kennedy had it, Ashdown had it, even Cable, Clegg and Farron had it a tiny bit. But Swinson and Davey not so much.
There’s an opportunity for the LibDems but I’m not convinced Davey is the one to exploit it fully.
Davey is not going to ever pull up any stumps in terms of charisma. It helps that he will be up against the wooden Starmer and petulant Sunak as comparators.
His target seat strategy is the correct position this GE, and focused on Tory held seats. He will have won if he puts LD back in 3rd place over SNP and gets more visibility next parliament, and the Jackpot if the balance of power in NOC.
NOC is unlikely but 3rd place is not.
The LDs had a good night, which prompts a long range betting tip for when individual GE seat markets go up. Have a look at my constituency, Tewkesbury. At first glance an LD victory looks unlikely but long-standing MP Laurence Robertson is retiring and the yellow peril has been advancing steadily in the area. The PC results showed strong yellow performances in the constituency (and also the Cotswolds, where Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown may also come under pressure.) Crucially, the LDs have now established themselves as the clear challengers so can legitimately campaign for Labour tactical votes. If they get that message across, they are in with a shout, and probably at decent odds.
Incidentally, the LDs just about swept the board in nearby Cheltenham. Local MP Alex Chalk looks to be done for, which is a pity. I think he is one of the best MPs in the House, regardless of Party.
With the current SNP woes, 25 seats or so would put LD back in 3rd party position and give useful scrutiny from a centre-left position of Starmer. I would see that as a good thing next Parliament
And before I go off to walk the dog on this fine sunny morning may I request a round of applause for young Mr Stodge, whose predictions were startlingly accurate.
He came close to scoring 100%. Harlow was a very near miss with the Tories holding on by just one seat. Havant was a real surprise. Otherwise, he was spot on.
If Sir Ed Davey manages to get NOM I’ll be very pleased.
Oh SKS is shite SED slightly less shite and a good LE2024 for him
I genuinely thought SED was a reference to the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands. I thought it was a bit strange, but "Sir Ed Davey" obviously hasn't really registered in my consciousness.
Same here, apart from the German thing. Until it was spelled out in a later post, I could not work out who was meant by SED. Now, the LibDems have gained a hatful of councillors so perhaps it does not matter, especially if they can regain third party status in the next House of Commons, but surely the party establishment must be looking around for its next star performer.
The third party has to have a leader with charisma. Kennedy had it, Ashdown had it, even Cable, Clegg and Farron had it a tiny bit. But Swinson and Davey not so much.
There’s an opportunity for the LibDems but I’m not convinced Davey is the one to exploit it fully.
Davey is not going to ever pull up any stumps in terms of charisma. It helps that he will be up against the wooden Starmer and petulant Sunak as comparators.
His target seat strategy is the correct position this GE, and focused on Tory held seats. He will have won if he puts LD back in 3rd place over SNP and gets more visibility next parliament, and the Jackpot if the balance of power in NOC.
NOC is unlikely but 3rd place is not.
The LDs had a good night, which prompts a long range betting tip for when individual GE seat markets go up. Have a look at my constituency, Tewkesbury. At first glance an LD victory looks unlikely but long-standing MP Laurence Robertson is retiring and the yellow peril has been advancing steadily in the area. The PC results showed strong yellow performances in the constituency (and also the Cotswolds, where Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown may also come under pressure.) Crucially, the LDs have now established themselves as the clear challengers so can legitimately campaign for Labour tactical votes. If they get that message across, they are in with a shout, and probably at decent odds.
Incidentally, the LDs just about swept the board in nearby Cheltenham. Local MP Alex Chalk looks to be done for, which is a pity. I think he is one of the best MPs in the House, regardless of Party.
All true people, but how much of that is simply the LDs getting carried a long by the general anti-Tory tide?
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
It's a view we all have to come to based on our own research but I think Hall was value when I laid Khan at 1.03 because her chances were always higher than 3%. That was just too low.
But even if her true chances were only, say, 15% then that made her value at that price.
You then have choices to trade or hold.
If the market moved in her direction based on turnout data, leaks and early results then, of course, you could then trade out at a profit.
If it looked like she'd run him even closer then you could hold it and trade out for an even higher price, or, once greened up, let it run all the way if you think there's a chance of a major upset.
Her true chances were always much lower than 15%. I think they were lower than 3%.
Consider: out of all the elections held on Thursday, how many saw the Conservatives *gain* a seat? A tiny handful, less than 1%. And that’s before you even get to the extensive polling in London.
But it’s great that you’ve made money on trading bets.
Watching a series of clips on Politics Joe of (mainly) Richard Holden going round every news studio soiling himself.
I know you have to try and spin a poor result, but you can't go about in open denial looking like you are massively disconnected from both reality and sanity.
Ric's career is probably in its twilight months. Ric's moment in the sun? Currygate! What an impressive legacy.
F1: the pre-qualifying ramble will go up before the sprint race, as I'm missing the latter due to other commitments (should be able to watch qualifying, though). So, that'll be late morning, most likely, whilst the pre-race tosh will be up sometime tomorrow.
I also missed the previous sprint race, as that was on at 4am or some such. It was still useful for pace ideas for the race, however (Norris winning his group).
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
Watching a series of clips on Politics Joe of (mainly) Richard Holden going round every news studio soiling himself.
I know you have to try and spin a poor result, but you can't go about in open denial looking like you are massively disconnected from both reality and sanity.
Err, have you not seen the favourite for the next President of the United States of America?
If Sir Ed Davey manages to get NOM I’ll be very pleased.
Oh SKS is shite SED slightly less shite and a good LE2024 for him
I genuinely thought SED was a reference to the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands. I thought it was a bit strange, but "Sir Ed Davey" obviously hasn't really registered in my consciousness.
Same here, apart from the German thing. Until it was spelled out in a later post, I could not work out who was meant by SED. Now, the LibDems have gained a hatful of councillors so perhaps it does not matter, especially if they can regain third party status in the next House of Commons, but surely the party establishment must be looking around for its next star performer.
The third party has to have a leader with charisma. Kennedy had it, Ashdown had it, even Cable, Clegg and Farron had it a tiny bit. But Swinson and Davey not so much.
There’s an opportunity for the LibDems but I’m not convinced Davey is the one to exploit it fully.
Davey is not going to ever pull up any stumps in terms of charisma. It helps that he will be up against the wooden Starmer and petulant Sunak as comparators.
His target seat strategy is the correct position this GE, and focused on Tory held seats. He will have won if he puts LD back in 3rd place over SNP and gets more visibility next parliament, and the Jackpot if the balance of power in NOC.
NOC is unlikely but 3rd place is not.
The LDs had a good night, which prompts a long range betting tip for when individual GE seat markets go up. Have a look at my constituency, Tewkesbury. At first glance an LD victory looks unlikely but long-standing MP Laurence Robertson is retiring and the yellow peril has been advancing steadily in the area. The PC results showed strong yellow performances in the constituency (and also the Cotswolds, where Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown may also come under pressure.) Crucially, the LDs have now established themselves as the clear challengers so can legitimately campaign for Labour tactical votes. If they get that message across, they are in with a shout, and probably at decent odds.
Incidentally, the LDs just about swept the board in nearby Cheltenham. Local MP Alex Chalk looks to be done for, which is a pity. I think he is one of the best MPs in the House, regardless of Party.
All true people, but how much of that is simply the LDs getting carried a long by the general anti-Tory tide?
Has Robertson said he's standing down? Not on the list.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
It's a view we all have to come to based on our own research but I think Hall was value when I laid Khan at 1.03 because her chances were always higher than 3%. That was just too low.
But even if her true chances were only, say, 15% then that made her value at that price.
You then have choices to trade or hold.
If the market moved in her direction based on turnout data, leaks and early results then, of course, you could then trade out at a profit.
If it looked like she'd run him even closer then you could hold it and trade out for an even higher price, or, once greened up, let it run all the way if you think there's a chance of a major upset.
Her true chances were always much lower than 15%. I think they were lower than 3%.
Consider: out of all the elections held on Thursday, how many saw the Conservatives *gain* a seat? A tiny handful, less than 1%. And that’s before you even get to the extensive polling in London.
But it’s great that you’ve made money on trading bets.
Its clearly more than 3% imo. but equally obviously for the bets to be matched in size, other people hold the opposite opinion.
Browsing the swings on council seats declared yesterday in the WM does show variable swings against Con in pretty much all seats in Wolverhampton, Walsall, Dudley and Solihull even if not many seats changed outside Dudley and swings less spectacular than elsewhere.
Unless there is some unusual split ticket voting (not impossible as that seems to have happened in Teesside) then Street may be too short at current odds.
I covered my Street stake at over 3/1 with a Labour bet earlier so effectively all green.
Still expect him to win, though. "Gaza" may lose SKS two mayoralities, which is really Netanyahu because he never had a choice of the Corbyn/Gorgeous approach that would have retained all those votes.
If he had, he'd have had a crap locals and wouldn't be on the way to No 10.
The Gaza war certainly has been quite challenging for Starmer. It is right to harshly condemn Hamas for their indiscriminate murders and rapes, but he shouldn't have been so enthusiastic in supporting cutting off food, water and medical supplies to Gaza.
Allowing Lab members to criticise the excessive Israeli response and call for ceasefire should have been permitted, provided there was no anti-semitism involved. While losing a few on the hard left is no great loss, losing people like Rosena Alin-Khan was foolish.
I am not sure who Foxjr2 voted for in London, but it wasn't going to be Labour because of Gaza. Its not just Muslims who couldn't stomach Starmers position. I see the Greens have benefitted in a number of places yesterday.
If Sir Ed Davey manages to get NOM I’ll be very pleased.
Oh SKS is shite SED slightly less shite and a good LE2024 for him
I genuinely thought SED was a reference to the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands. I thought it was a bit strange, but "Sir Ed Davey" obviously hasn't really registered in my consciousness.
Same here, apart from the German thing. Until it was spelled out in a later post, I could not work out who was meant by SED. Now, the LibDems have gained a hatful of councillors so perhaps it does not matter, especially if they can regain third party status in the next House of Commons, but surely the party establishment must be looking around for its next star performer.
The third party has to have a leader with charisma. Kennedy had it, Ashdown had it, even Cable, Clegg and Farron had it a tiny bit. But Swinson and Davey not so much.
There’s an opportunity for the LibDems but I’m not convinced Davey is the one to exploit it fully.
Davey is not going to ever pull up any stumps in terms of charisma. It helps that he will be up against the wooden Starmer and petulant Sunak as comparators.
His target seat strategy is the correct position this GE, and focused on Tory held seats. He will have won if he puts LD back in 3rd place over SNP and gets more visibility next parliament, and the Jackpot if the balance of power in NOC.
NOC is unlikely but 3rd place is not.
The LDs had a good night, which prompts a long range betting tip for when individual GE seat markets go up. Have a look at my constituency, Tewkesbury. At first glance an LD victory looks unlikely but long-standing MP Laurence Robertson is retiring and the yellow peril has been advancing steadily in the area. The PC results showed strong yellow performances in the constituency (and also the Cotswolds, where Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown may also come under pressure.) Crucially, the LDs have now established themselves as the clear challengers so can legitimately campaign for Labour tactical votes. If they get that message across, they are in with a shout, and probably at decent odds.
Incidentally, the LDs just about swept the board in nearby Cheltenham. Local MP Alex Chalk looks to be done for, which is a pity. I think he is one of the best MPs in the House, regardless of Party.
All true people, but how much of that is simply the LDs getting carried a long by the general anti-Tory tide?
Has Robertson said he's standing down? Not on the list.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Um hold on. A "value bet" is a bet made on the assumption that the odds will change in your favour. It becomes a "trading bet" if it is traded out before the results are known. If ridden all the way down to the result and it loses, then it becomes a "value loser". Or have I got this wrong?
I think you might have. A value bet is one where the odds you get are better than the odds you assess (hoping these are accurate!), such that making a load of such bets over a lifetime pays off in the long run. There isn’t any expectation of future changes in odds - that’s a trading bet.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
It's a view we all have to come to based on our own research but I think Hall was value when I laid Khan at 1.03 because her chances were always higher than 3%. That was just too low.
But even if her true chances were only, say, 15% then that made her value at that price.
You then have choices to trade or hold.
If the market moved in her direction based on turnout data, leaks and early results then, of course, you could then trade out at a profit.
If it looked like she'd run him even closer then you could hold it and trade out for an even higher price, or, once greened up, let it run all the way if you think there's a chance of a major upset.
Her true chances were always much lower than 15%. I think they were lower than 3%.
Consider: out of all the elections held on Thursday, how many saw the Conservatives *gain* a seat? A tiny handful, less than 1%. And that’s before you even get to the extensive polling in London.
But it’s great that you’ve made money on trading bets.
Yes, but that's nonsense, isn't it?
If she runs the election close that's evidence enough in and of itself, but with anti-ULEZ, anti-Gaza, general anti-Khan malaise and only a 5% margin of victory last time (with a FPTP voting system this time) its absurd to suggest her chances were so low.
What people are telegraphing here is they really don't like her at all, or want her to win, so don't want to give any other narrative other than she's a totally hopeless cause lest it give her some momentum.
We see similar with Trump posts on here and you should absolutely never bet like that.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
And before I go off to walk the dog on this fine sunny morning may I request a round of applause for young Mr Stodge, whose predictions were startlingly accurate.
He came close to scoring 100%. Harlow was a very near miss with the Tories holding on by just one seat. Havant was a real surprise. Otherwise, he was spot on.
Well, I expected to go through Kirklees (before branching out elsewhere) looking at the state of Lab-Con marginals.
But I'm going to start with the safe Labour seats that I expected to ignore.
Changes are on the 2023 local round.
LE results for Huddersfield constituency (2024 boundaries):
Labour: 33.8% (-11.7) Green 31.9 (+10.5) Con 15.6 (-3.1) LD 12.8 (-0.4) Others 6.0 (+4.9)
There is a green base anyway, but serious pro green swings in 2 wards brought Green to near parity. They gained one ward to hold two, and lost to Labour by 1% in a ward where another independent split the pro-Palestine vote, accounting for 3.6% of the constituency vote alone and also preventing a Green plurality.
Can they establish themselves as contenders at parliamentary level?
Well, I expected to go through Kirklees (before branching out elsewhere) looking at the state of Lab-Con marginals.
But I'm going to start with the safe Labour seats that I expected to ignore.
Changes are on the 2023 local round.
LE results for Huddersfield constituency (2024 boundaries):
Labour: 33.8% (-11.7) Green 31.9 (+10.5) Con 15.6 (-3.1) LD 12.8 (-0.4) Others 6.0 (+4.9)
There is a green base anyway, but serious pro green swings in 2 wards brought Green to near parity. They gained one ward to hold two, and lost to Labour by 1% in a ward where another independent split the pro-Palestine vote, accounting for 3.6% of the constituency vote alone and also preventing a Green plurality.
Can they establish themselves as contenders at parliamentary level?
NO.
By contenders, I simply don't envisage in any way a serious Green challenge to Labour winning the seat at GE24/25.. It would be more a "Con never win here, Greens are the challengers" pitch for second place. The establishment of a target seat for 2029 and beyond, based on a mix of student, base community support and Muslim support.
Of course the underlying landscape will change, the Green vote has grown in specific wards on the specific issue of Gaza to sit atop a base Green vote and that may not be long term enough to establish a longer term shift.
I think in the same way that LD might position themselves to challenge an unpopular Labour government in Hull seats in the future (and there is a history of a LD/Labour interface even if it is not prevalent now).
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Um hold on. A "value bet" is a bet made on the assumption that the odds will change in your favour. It becomes a "trading bet" if it is traded out before the results are known. If ridden all the way down to the result and it loses, then it becomes a "value loser". Or have I got this wrong?
I think you might have. A value bet is one where the odds you get are better than the odds you assess (hoping these are accurate!), such that making a load of such bets over a lifetime pays off in the long run. There isn’t any expectation of future changes in odds - that’s a trading bet.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Um hold on. A "value bet" is a bet made on the assumption that the odds will change in your favour. It becomes a "trading bet" if it is traded out before the results are known. If ridden all the way down to the result and it loses, then it becomes a "value loser". Or have I got this wrong?
I think you might have. A value bet is one where the odds you get are better than the odds you assess (hoping these are accurate!), such that making a load of such bets over a lifetime pays off in the long run. There isn’t any expectation of future changes in odds - that’s a trading bet.
Agree with all of that except the last sentence.
All bets are dynamic. They exist in a market.
Yes if something is value, it will tend to move in the direction of its true price, for obvious reasons, so there is a default expectation of future changes of odds for value bets even when that isn't the raison d'etre of the bet.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
It's a view we all have to come to based on our own research but I think Hall was value when I laid Khan at 1.03 because her chances were always higher than 3%. That was just too low.
But even if her true chances were only, say, 15% then that made her value at that price.
You then have choices to trade or hold.
If the market moved in her direction based on turnout data, leaks and early results then, of course, you could then trade out at a profit.
If it looked like she'd run him even closer then you could hold it and trade out for an even higher price, or, once greened up, let it run all the way if you think there's a chance of a major upset.
Her true chances were always much lower than 15%. I think they were lower than 3%.
Consider: out of all the elections held on Thursday, how many saw the Conservatives *gain* a seat? A tiny handful, less than 1%. And that’s before you even get to the extensive polling in London.
But it’s great that you’ve made money on trading bets.
Yes, but that's nonsense, isn't it?
If she runs the election close that's evidence enough in and of itself, but with anti-ULEZ, anti-Gaza, general anti-Khan malaise and only a 5% margin of victory last time (with a FPTP voting system this time) its absurd to suggest her chances were so low.
What people are telegraphing here is they really don't like her at all, or want her to win, so don't want to give any other narrative other than she's a totally hopeless cause lest it give her some momentum.
We see similar with Trump posts on here and you should absolutely never bet like that.
I'm interested in why there has been so much briefing that she is going to win. If she loses handily to Khan after all this, the right wing of the Tory party starts to look a bit silly.
Woking is now a Tory free zone. I lived there for many years from the age of 9 and it was always solid Tory. The idea that there is not a single one left is bewildering.
Woking by name...
I always thought Woking was a diminutive of Wokingham, but apparently they are 2 different places!
Woking is in Surrey, not too far from London, Wokingham is in Berkshire, close to Reading.
I see. Which one is part of Basingstoke?
Basingstoke is rather far from either, in Hampshire. Roughly 50 miles from central London.
All 'near London' so far as I'm concerned!
I do genuinely confuse Woking and Wokingham, I knew one of them was in Surrey.
A friend of mine accidentally went to meet some people in Gillingham, Kent, when they were actually meeting in Gillingham, Dorset. True story from the days before mobile phones.
Stories like that pop up in the Kent press/news websites every so often still. One poor girl was due to be in a cheerleading competition in the Medway Town but ended up in Dorset.
Ashford, Kent and Ashford, Middx sometimes cause confusion but less often.
It’s Saturday morning and there are still a stack of results awaited. Yet more American influence on our politics is most disappointing.
In most US elections (2020 being the exception). the winner is normally known by breakfast time in the UK the next day. That said, not sure why eg London counting Saturday and not Friday - anyone know why?
Tories cancelled the ability for London to use electronic counting. Votes were manually verified yesterday and will be manually counted today.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
It's a view we all have to come to based on our own research but I think Hall was value when I laid Khan at 1.03 because her chances were always higher than 3%. That was just too low.
But even if her true chances were only, say, 15% then that made her value at that price.
You then have choices to trade or hold.
If the market moved in her direction based on turnout data, leaks and early results then, of course, you could then trade out at a profit.
If it looked like she'd run him even closer then you could hold it and trade out for an even higher price, or, once greened up, let it run all the way if you think there's a chance of a major upset.
Her true chances were always much lower than 15%. I think they were lower than 3%.
Consider: out of all the elections held on Thursday, how many saw the Conservatives *gain* a seat? A tiny handful, less than 1%. And that’s before you even get to the extensive polling in London.
But it’s great that you’ve made money on trading bets.
Yes, but that's nonsense, isn't it?
If she runs the election close that's evidence enough in and of itself, but with anti-ULEZ, anti-Gaza, general anti-Khan malaise and only a 5% margin of victory last time (with a FPTP voting system this time) its absurd to suggest her chances were so low.
What people are telegraphing here is they really don't like her at all, or want her to win, so don't want to give any other narrative other than she's a totally hopeless cause lest it give her some momentum.
We see similar with Trump posts on here and you should absolutely never bet like that.
There are a few other factors too in the London mayor race, notably a generalised anti-incumbency feeling as we see in Scotland against SNP, Lab in Wales (see yesterday's PCC results) and pretty much everywhere in England. Mostly against Tories, but also against Labour in some councils. That will have hurt Khan.
Against this there has been a clear swing against the Tories nationally, so that won't have helped Hall, even if Khan polls poorly. I suspect a third of the vote in London will be for the other parties, with poor shares for both Hall and Khan despite being FPTP.
Not sure what the current situation is with discussing 'AI'. But I watched this video last night on youtube about AI generated music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhbaXx_ao2Y And then tried composing my own songs on www.udio.com through prompts. Not difficult to see how we could soon have an alternative spotify catalogue of music created entirely by AI.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
I think I disagree. If you back Hall at 10-1 and the bet wins, I think you can be fairly sure that it was value. Much surer than finding a punter who has made a profit and saying that therefore their bets are value. After all there are millions of mug punters, some of them will have made a profit purely by luck.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Um hold on. A "value bet" is a bet made on the assumption that the odds will change in your favour. It becomes a "trading bet" if it is traded out before the results are known. If ridden all the way down to the result and it loses, then it becomes a "value loser". Or have I got this wrong?
I think you might have. A value bet is one where the odds you get are better than the odds you assess (hoping these are accurate!), such that making a load of such bets over a lifetime pays off in the long run. There isn’t any expectation of future changes in odds - that’s a trading bet.
Agree with all of that except the last sentence.
All bets are dynamic. They exist in a market.
Of course, but the central point is that a value bet can be made without, and doesn’t contain any expectation of, future trading. Of course, if the odds move in a favourable direction it can be turned into a trading bet, but that isn’t the point of making it.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
It's a view we all have to come to based on our own research but I think Hall was value when I laid Khan at 1.03 because her chances were always higher than 3%. That was just too low.
But even if her true chances were only, say, 15% then that made her value at that price.
You then have choices to trade or hold.
If the market moved in her direction based on turnout data, leaks and early results then, of course, you could then trade out at a profit.
If it looked like she'd run him even closer then you could hold it and trade out for an even higher price, or, once greened up, let it run all the way if you think there's a chance of a major upset.
Her true chances were always much lower than 15%. I think they were lower than 3%.
Consider: out of all the elections held on Thursday, how many saw the Conservatives *gain* a seat? A tiny handful, less than 1%. And that’s before you even get to the extensive polling in London.
But it’s great that you’ve made money on trading bets.
Yes, but that's nonsense, isn't it?
If she runs the election close that's evidence enough in and of itself, but with anti-ULEZ, anti-Gaza, general anti-Khan malaise and only a 5% margin of victory last time (with a FPTP voting system this time) its absurd to suggest her chances were so low.
What people are telegraphing here is they really don't like her at all, or want her to win, so don't want to give any other narrative other than she's a totally hopeless cause lest it give her some momentum.
We see similar with Trump posts on here and you should absolutely never bet like that.
I'm interested in why there has been so much briefing that she is going to win. If she loses handily to Khan after all this, the right wing of the Tory party starts to look a bit silly.
But you could see why the Conservatives want to take attention away from other terrible results, to a result that might not be quite so terrible in the end even if she loses. And you could see why Khan might want to do some expectation management - if he now wins by 10% that will look like a good result, rather than underperforming.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
Indeed, we will never know for sure.
There is a small chance of almost anything happening. But that chance is rarely 5%.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
I think I disagree. If you back Hall at 10-1 and the bet wins, I think you can be fairly sure that it was value. Much surer than finding a punter who has made a profit and saying that therefore their bets are value. After all there are millions of mug punters, some of them will have made a profit purely by luck.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
This is nonsense I am afraid.
A batch of a thousand 10/1 bets includes hundreds that should be about 10/1, a few that are perhaps as low as 5/1, a few others that might be as big as 50/1. Each sample produces winners.
By drawing a single winner out of the sample, you cannot know if you had a 5/1, 10/1 or 50/1 type bet.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
I think I disagree. If you back Hall at 10-1 and the bet wins, I think you can be fairly sure that it was value. Much surer than finding a punter who has made a profit and saying that therefore their bets are value. After all there are millions of mug punters, some of them will have made a profit purely by luck.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
This is nonsense I am afraid.
A batch of a thousand 10/1 bets includes hundreds that should be about 10/1, a few that are perhaps as low as 5/1, a few others that might be as big as 50/1. Each sample produces winners.
By drawing a single winner out of the sample, you cannot know if you had a 5/1, 10/1 or 50/1 type bet.
But we are talking about a votes that will either be close or not. If Khan wins by 25% then I will assume that it was never evens that he would lose, while you will think that there is no way of knowing if he should have actually been 50-1?
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
I think I disagree. If you back Hall at 10-1 and the bet wins, I think you can be fairly sure that it was value. Much surer than finding a punter who has made a profit and saying that therefore their bets are value. After all there are millions of mug punters, some of them will have made a profit purely by luck.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
This is nonsense I am afraid.
A batch of a thousand 10/1 bets includes hundreds that should be about 10/1, a few that are perhaps as low as 5/1, a few others that might be as big as 50/1. Each sample produces winners.
By drawing a single winner out of the sample, you cannot know if you had a 5/1, 10/1 or 50/1 type bet.
But we are talking about a votes that will either be close or not. If Khan wins by 25% then I will assume that it was never evens that he would lose, while you will think that there is no way of knowing if he should have actually been 50-1?
Suspecting yes, knowing is not possible for the reasons given above. You are just getting a single data point and that mathematically cannot be enough to prove something being value at 10/1.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
Indeed, we will never know for sure.
There is a small chance of almost anything happening. But that chance is rarely 5%.
That's true, but Conservatives have won 2/5 London mayoral elections, so in principle it's not an 'almost anything' kind of occurrence.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
I think I disagree. If you back Hall at 10-1 and the bet wins, I think you can be fairly sure that it was value. Much surer than finding a punter who has made a profit and saying that therefore their bets are value. After all there are millions of mug punters, some of them will have made a profit purely by luck.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
This is nonsense I am afraid.
A batch of a thousand 10/1 bets includes hundreds that should be about 10/1, a few that are perhaps as low as 5/1, a few others that might be as big as 50/1. Each sample produces winners.
By drawing a single winner out of the sample, you cannot know if you had a 5/1, 10/1 or 50/1 type bet.
But we are talking about a votes that will either be close or not. If Khan wins by 25% then I will assume that it was never evens that he would lose, while you will think that there is no way of knowing if he should have actually been 50-1?
Suspecting yes, knowing is not possible for the reasons given above. You are just getting a single data point and that mathematically cannot be enough to prove something being value at 10/1.
Well, obviously I'm not talking about mathematically proving something. I'm just curious about how people are calculating at what point a bet on Hall becomes value. And how they then check their assessment against the actual result when it comes out. Presumably we can agree that backing Hall at 1000/1 would be good value, and backing her at 1/3 would be terrible value.
IanB2 thinks Hall is not value at 19/1. Would he think he got that wrong if Khan wins by 2%? I think he probably should - do you really think that he would be wrong to make any attempt at assessing his judgement once we know the results?
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
Indeed, we will never know for sure.
There is a small chance of almost anything happening. But that chance is rarely 5%.
That's true, but Conservatives have won 2/5 London mayoral elections, so in principle it's not an 'almost anything' kind of occurrence.
In normal circs, given that Khan is a lacklustre Mayor with several issues against him, that might be true despite London being solidly Labour.
But against the background of Hall being a hopeless candidate and the Tories being deeply deeply unpopular - such that a lot of voters who may not even know who the mayor is will have voted against them - her chances of winning were never 5%.
The London Mayor verification was yesterday. The count is today. Does anyone know if the verification was face up or face down? It makes a big difference.
If Sir Ed Davey manages to get NOM I’ll be very pleased.
Oh SKS is shite SED slightly less shite and a good LE2024 for him
I genuinely thought SED was a reference to the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands. I thought it was a bit strange, but "Sir Ed Davey" obviously hasn't really registered in my consciousness.
Same here, apart from the German thing. Until it was spelled out in a later post, I could not work out who was meant by SED. Now, the LibDems have gained a hatful of councillors so perhaps it does not matter, especially if they can regain third party status in the next House of Commons, but surely the party establishment must be looking around for its next star performer.
The third party has to have a leader with charisma. Kennedy had it, Ashdown had it, even Cable, Clegg and Farron had it a tiny bit. But Swinson and Davey not so much.
There’s an opportunity for the LibDems but I’m not convinced Davey is the one to exploit it fully.
Davey is not going to ever pull up any stumps in terms of charisma. It helps that he will be up against the wooden Starmer and petulant Sunak as comparators.
His target seat strategy is the correct position this GE, and focused on Tory held seats. He will have won if he puts LD back in 3rd place over SNP and gets more visibility next parliament, and the Jackpot if the balance of power in NOC.
NOC is unlikely but 3rd place is not.
The LDs had a good night, which prompts a long range betting tip for when individual GE seat markets go up. Have a look at my constituency, Tewkesbury. At first glance an LD victory looks unlikely but long-standing MP Laurence Robertson is retiring and the yellow peril has been advancing steadily in the area. The PC results showed strong yellow performances in the constituency (and also the Cotswolds, where Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown may also come under pressure.) Crucially, the LDs have now established themselves as the clear challengers so can legitimately campaign for Labour tactical votes. If they get that message across, they are in with a shout, and probably at decent odds.
Incidentally, the LDs just about swept the board in nearby Cheltenham. Local MP Alex Chalk looks to be done for, which is a pity. I think he is one of the best MPs in the House, regardless of Party.
All true people, but how much of that is simply the LDs getting carried a long by the general anti-Tory tide?
It's more the result of decades od activism in the area. Where that hasn't happened, the Lib Dems are are in single figured. However, where they have worked they are very strong. The NEV hides these pockets of Lib Dem strength and thus underestimates their potential gains in seats. There are now several seats in Wessex that look very good for Ed Davey which are not on the media radar at all. Some like Cheltenham and Winchester look near certain. However there are several others across the country. On a good night the Lib Dems could find their concentrated vote finally makes FPTP work in their favour.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
I think I disagree. If you back Hall at 10-1 and the bet wins, I think you can be fairly sure that it was value. Much surer than finding a punter who has made a profit and saying that therefore their bets are value. After all there are millions of mug punters, some of them will have made a profit purely by luck.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
This is nonsense I am afraid.
A batch of a thousand 10/1 bets includes hundreds that should be about 10/1, a few that are perhaps as low as 5/1, a few others that might be as big as 50/1. Each sample produces winners.
By drawing a single winner out of the sample, you cannot know if you had a 5/1, 10/1 or 50/1 type bet.
But we are talking about a votes that will either be close or not. If Khan wins by 25% then I will assume that it was never evens that he would lose, while you will think that there is no way of knowing if he should have actually been 50-1?
Suspecting yes, knowing is not possible for the reasons given above. You are just getting a single data point and that mathematically cannot be enough to prove something being value at 10/1.
Well, obviously I'm not talking about mathematically proving something. I'm just curious about how people are calculating at what point a bet on Hall becomes value. And how they then check their assessment against the actual result when it comes out. Presumably we can agree that backing Hall at 1000/1 would be good value, and backing her at 1/3 would be terrible value.
IanB2 thinks Hall is not value at 19/1. Would he think he got that wrong if Khan wins by 2%? I think he probably should - do you really think that he would be wrong to make any attempt at assessing his judgement once we know the results?
A review after a bet is fine, but any assessment on a single event should only ever have minor weight.
One of the main reasons bookies win money, is punters have a big win, over assess their abilities on the back of it and then go on to lose it all back and more.
The best assessments of whether bets are value is with sample sizes where you can test things to a high degree of confidence. The rest is mostly fluff and opinion.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
I think I disagree. If you back Hall at 10-1 and the bet wins, I think you can be fairly sure that it was value. Much surer than finding a punter who has made a profit and saying that therefore their bets are value. After all there are millions of mug punters, some of them will have made a profit purely by luck.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
If Sir Ed Davey manages to get NOM I’ll be very pleased.
Oh SKS is shite SED slightly less shite and a good LE2024 for him
I genuinely thought SED was a reference to the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands. I thought it was a bit strange, but "Sir Ed Davey" obviously hasn't really registered in my consciousness.
Same here, apart from the German thing. Until it was spelled out in a later post, I could not work out who was meant by SED. Now, the LibDems have gained a hatful of councillors so perhaps it does not matter, especially if they can regain third party status in the next House of Commons, but surely the party establishment must be looking around for its next star performer.
The third party has to have a leader with charisma. Kennedy had it, Ashdown had it, even Cable, Clegg and Farron had it a tiny bit. But Swinson and Davey not so much.
There’s an opportunity for the LibDems but I’m not convinced Davey is the one to exploit it fully.
Davey is not going to ever pull up any stumps in terms of charisma. It helps that he will be up against the wooden Starmer and petulant Sunak as comparators.
His target seat strategy is the correct position this GE, and focused on Tory held seats. He will have won if he puts LD back in 3rd place over SNP and gets more visibility next parliament, and the Jackpot if the balance of power in NOC.
NOC is unlikely but 3rd place is not.
The LDs had a good night, which prompts a long range betting tip for when individual GE seat markets go up. Have a look at my constituency, Tewkesbury. At first glance an LD victory looks unlikely but long-standing MP Laurence Robertson is retiring and the yellow peril has been advancing steadily in the area. The PC results showed strong yellow performances in the constituency (and also the Cotswolds, where Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown may also come under pressure.) Crucially, the LDs have now established themselves as the clear challengers so can legitimately campaign for Labour tactical votes. If they get that message across, they are in with a shout, and probably at decent odds.
Incidentally, the LDs just about swept the board in nearby Cheltenham. Local MP Alex Chalk looks to be done for, which is a pity. I think he is one of the best MPs in the House, regardless of Party.
All true people, but how much of that is simply the LDs getting carried a long by the general anti-Tory tide?
Has Robertson said he's standing down? Not on the list.
Sorry meant for Peter the Punter
So I heard. Not sure from where. May have been here, so don't quote me if it's not official.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
I think I disagree. If you back Hall at 10-1 and the bet wins, I think you can be fairly sure that it was value. Much surer than finding a punter who has made a profit and saying that therefore their bets are value. After all there are millions of mug punters, some of them will have made a profit purely by luck.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
This is nonsense I am afraid.
A batch of a thousand 10/1 bets includes hundreds that should be about 10/1, a few that are perhaps as low as 5/1, a few others that might be as big as 50/1. Each sample produces winners.
By drawing a single winner out of the sample, you cannot know if you had a 5/1, 10/1 or 50/1 type bet.
But we are talking about a votes that will either be close or not. If Khan wins by 25% then I will assume that it was never evens that he would lose, while you will think that there is no way of knowing if he should have actually been 50-1?
Suspecting yes, knowing is not possible for the reasons given above. You are just getting a single data point and that mathematically cannot be enough to prove something being value at 10/1.
Well, obviously I'm not talking about mathematically proving something. I'm just curious about how people are calculating at what point a bet on Hall becomes value. And how they then check their assessment against the actual result when it comes out. Presumably we can agree that backing Hall at 1000/1 would be good value, and backing her at 1/3 would be terrible value.
IanB2 thinks Hall is not value at 19/1. Would he think he got that wrong if Khan wins by 2%? I think he probably should - do you really think that he would be wrong to make any attempt at assessing his judgement once we know the results?
A review after a bet is fine, but any assessment on a single event should only ever have minor weight.
One of the main reasons bookies win money, is punters have a big win, over assess their abilities on the back of it and then go on to lose it all back and more.
The best assessments of whether bets are value is with sample sizes where you can test things to a high degree of confidence. The rest is mostly fluff and opinion.
Yes, that is very true.
But I'm still curious about how we can judge IanB2's statement that 19/1 on Hall is not value. Personally, off the top of my head without doing a massive amount of research, I'd want more than 20/1 to back Hall. But at the same time I wouldn't be rushing to back Khan at 1/20, so it's hard to say.
If Sir Ed Davey manages to get NOM I’ll be very pleased.
Oh SKS is shite SED slightly less shite and a good LE2024 for him
I genuinely thought SED was a reference to the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands. I thought it was a bit strange, but "Sir Ed Davey" obviously hasn't really registered in my consciousness.
Same here, apart from the German thing. Until it was spelled out in a later post, I could not work out who was meant by SED. Now, the LibDems have gained a hatful of councillors so perhaps it does not matter, especially if they can regain third party status in the next House of Commons, but surely the party establishment must be looking around for its next star performer.
The third party has to have a leader with charisma. Kennedy had it, Ashdown had it, even Cable, Clegg and Farron had it a tiny bit. But Swinson and Davey not so much.
There’s an opportunity for the LibDems but I’m not convinced Davey is the one to exploit it fully.
Davey is not going to ever pull up any stumps in terms of charisma. It helps that he will be up against the wooden Starmer and petulant Sunak as comparators.
His target seat strategy is the correct position this GE, and focused on Tory held seats. He will have won if he puts LD back in 3rd place over SNP and gets more visibility next parliament, and the Jackpot if the balance of power in NOC.
NOC is unlikely but 3rd place is not.
The LDs had a good night, which prompts a long range betting tip for when individual GE seat markets go up. Have a look at my constituency, Tewkesbury. At first glance an LD victory looks unlikely but long-standing MP Laurence Robertson is retiring and the yellow peril has been advancing steadily in the area. The PC results showed strong yellow performances in the constituency (and also the Cotswolds, where Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown may also come under pressure.) Crucially, the LDs have now established themselves as the clear challengers so can legitimately campaign for Labour tactical votes. If they get that message across, they are in with a shout, and probably at decent odds.
Incidentally, the LDs just about swept the board in nearby Cheltenham. Local MP Alex Chalk looks to be done for, which is a pity. I think he is one of the best MPs in the House, regardless of Party.
All true people, but how much of that is simply the LDs getting carried a long by the general anti-Tory tide?
And that is the million dollar question. To what extent this now becomes the permanently changed landscape now the Tory’s own Brexit.
We now have a House of Commons out of kilter with this changed landscape now the Tory’s own Brexit - if they both match after the General Election, to what extent does that become the norm as well?
Cheltenham for example, no Conservative councillors left, at what point do they win the parliamentary seat back?
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
Betting for Dummies.......... it is value when you win
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
It's a view we all have to come to based on our own research but I think Hall was value when I laid Khan at 1.03 because her chances were always higher than 3%. That was just too low.
But even if her true chances were only, say, 15% then that made her value at that price.
You then have choices to trade or hold.
If the market moved in her direction based on turnout data, leaks and early results then, of course, you could then trade out at a profit.
If it looked like she'd run him even closer then you could hold it and trade out for an even higher price, or, once greened up, let it run all the way if you think there's a chance of a major upset.
Her true chances were always much lower than 15%. I think they were lower than 3%.
Consider: out of all the elections held on Thursday, how many saw the Conservatives *gain* a seat? A tiny handful, less than 1%. And that’s before you even get to the extensive polling in London.
But it’s great that you’ve made money on trading bets.
Yes, but that's nonsense, isn't it?
If she runs the election close that's evidence enough in and of itself, but with anti-ULEZ, anti-Gaza, general anti-Khan malaise and only a 5% margin of victory last time (with a FPTP voting system this time) its absurd to suggest her chances were so low.
What people are telegraphing here is they really don't like her at all, or want her to win, so don't want to give any other narrative other than she's a totally hopeless cause lest it give her some momentum.
We see similar with Trump posts on here and you should absolutely never bet like that.
Why is that nonsense? The overriding factor in this round of elections is the very large, national Con->Lab swing since 2021. You can’t just pretend that hasn’t happened. You then look at what happened in 2021 in a contest. What that means is that we would expect Lab/Con contests won by Labour last time to be won by Labour again and any changes to be Tory seats falling to Labour.
We have more than enough results now to test this hypothesis. We’ve had >2000 results, which the largest chunk being Lab/Con contests. What do we see? Almost every Lab/Con contest won by Labour last time has been held by Labour. There have been at least 2 Con gains, but that’s a tiny proportion. The Conservatives gaining from Labour is clearly very, very, very unlikely.
That’s my baseline. Conservatives won’t win seats from Labour. But, sure, there are other factors to consider.
There’s a change in the voting system. However, no London mayoral election has ever been determined by second preferences. Khan last time, and the time before, won on first preferences and with second preferences. So, that doesn’t suggest FPTP will matter much. Indeed, if anything, I would guess FPTP harms Hall more because of the rise in Reform UK support.
Anti-ULEZ malaise? The test of that is the Uxbridge by-election, which saw a 6.7% swing to Labour. Add a 6.7% swing to Labour on the 2021 result and you get… oh, a large Khan win. And ULEZ has certainly become less of an issue since then.
Gaza? Sure, that could hurt Khan, although it won’t mean votes going to Hall, and Khan being Muslim himself and Hall’s Islamophobia could be factors that reduce any Gaza effect.
And then we have the polling! The polling ranges from a massive Khan victory to a small Khan victory. The polls were off last time, overestimating the Labour vote, but the polls were pretty accurate in prior mayoral contests. Even if you take the 2021 polling error and apply it to the 2024 polls, Khan wins.
So, for Hall to win, you need a greater polling error than ever before, *and* you need the national swing to Labour to go in reverse. Given that, I think your estimate of a 15% chance for Hall to win is ludicrous. Estimating unlikely things gets difficult, so maybe you can make a case that she’s got a 3% chance, but I don’t see it.
(1) SkyBet paid out on Houchen bet at 2/7 (2) Hills bet at 7/4 on Street (now all greened up) (3) Exchange Khan / Hall - profit either way now, but balance on Hall in 3 figures (4) Ladbrokes Khan bet share in 35-40% range - odds on
I stand to make over £400 profit at the moment
Well done; sensible to have laid off on Hall. In the end it wasn’t a value bet, but a trading bet.
Thanks. The two aren't mutually exclusive. A value bet provides opportunities for trading, which is why it's value.
I still await to see with interest how close it is later today.
Well, the object is different, I’d suggest, and they are separate concepts which whilst not mutually exclusive also don’t necessarily overlap.
A value bet is, as you described earlier, one in which even though you lose more often than you win, the odds make it attractive in the long run. The poker analogy being betting a flush draw at low stake, where the payouts when your suit card comes up more than cover the losses when it doesn’t. The trick there is correctly assessing low probability events, and it remains my view that Hall was never a value bet from that perspective.
A trading bet is one that stands to lose, but where you anticipate a narrowing at some point before the result is declared, so you can lay off at a profit. The object is not to be holding the bet at the end, in contrast to the above. Elections with a clear front runner but where there is a delayed count are perhaps ideally suited to such opportunities, given the febrile atmosphere and tendency for thin rumours to gain fast traction, and that may be a learning point from this contest with useful application going forward?
OK, but at what odds would backing Hall/laying Khan (I assume we still don't know the result) be value - using your stricter definition? You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
It is impossible to know with certainty that such a bet was value or not. What can be tested is whether a bettor can consistently find a basket of bets that are value. Its also called winning.
I think I disagree. If you back Hall at 10-1 and the bet wins, I think you can be fairly sure that it was value. Much surer than finding a punter who has made a profit and saying that therefore their bets are value. After all there are millions of mug punters, some of them will have made a profit purely by luck.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
This is nonsense I am afraid.
A batch of a thousand 10/1 bets includes hundreds that should be about 10/1, a few that are perhaps as low as 5/1, a few others that might be as big as 50/1. Each sample produces winners.
By drawing a single winner out of the sample, you cannot know if you had a 5/1, 10/1 or 50/1 type bet.
But we are talking about a votes that will either be close or not. If Khan wins by 25% then I will assume that it was never evens that he would lose, while you will think that there is no way of knowing if he should have actually been 50-1?
You're right to say the margin is with hindsight a key piece of evidence as to the value of a bet. Esp a bet struck close in time to the event.
Comments
But even if her true chances were only, say, 15% then that made her value at that price.
You then have choices to trade or hold.
If the market moved in her direction based on turnout data, leaks and early results then, of course, you could then trade out at a profit.
If it looked like she'd run him even closer then you could hold it and trade out for an even higher price, or, once greened up, let it run all the way if you think there's a chance of a major upset.
The LDs had a good night, which prompts a long range betting tip for when individual GE seat markets go up. Have a look at my constituency, Tewkesbury. At first glance an LD victory looks unlikely but long-standing MP Laurence Robertson is retiring and the yellow peril has been advancing steadily in the area. The PC results showed strong yellow performances in the constituency (and also the Cotswolds, where Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown may also come under pressure.) Crucially, the LDs have now established themselves as the clear challengers so can legitimately campaign for Labour tactical votes. If they get that message across, they are in with a shout, and probably at decent odds.
Incidentally, the LDs just about swept the board in nearby Cheltenham. Local MP Alex Chalk looks to be done for, which is a pity. I think he is one of the best MPs in the House, regardless of Party.
https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1786514098705883526?t=Q7NDDD4BPk6DjGYOVEaHjg&s=19
Unless there is some unusual split ticket voting (not impossible as that seems to have happened in Teesside) then Street may be too short at current odds.
I know you have to try and spin a poor result, but you can't go about in open denial looking like you are massively disconnected from both reality and sanity.
Still expect him to win, though. "Gaza" may lose SKS two mayoralities, which is really Netanyahu because he never had a choice of the Corbyn/Gorgeous approach that would have retained all those votes.
If he had, he'd have had a crap locals and wouldn't be on the way to No 10.
He came close to scoring 100%. Harlow was a very near miss with the Tories holding on by just one seat. Havant was a real surprise. Otherwise, he was spot on.
Take a bow, Sir.
Consider: out of all the elections held on Thursday, how many saw the Conservatives *gain* a seat? A tiny handful, less than 1%. And that’s before you even get to the extensive polling in London.
But it’s great that you’ve made money on trading bets.
F1: the pre-qualifying ramble will go up before the sprint race, as I'm missing the latter due to other commitments (should be able to watch qualifying, though). So, that'll be late morning, most likely, whilst the pre-race tosh will be up sometime tomorrow.
I also missed the previous sprint race, as that was on at 4am or some such. It was still useful for pace ideas for the race, however (Norris winning his group).
You say Hall was never a value bet, but some people backed her at 30-1 or higher. So presumably you would need significantly more than that?
Also even when we know the result, how can we decide if backing her at, say 10-1 was value or not? If she's won it was value. But can we say if Khan has won by less than 5% then 10-1 was value? Can we say if Khan has won by more than 10% then 10-1 was never value?
Allowing Lab members to criticise the excessive Israeli response and call for ceasefire should have been permitted, provided there was no anti-semitism involved. While losing a few on the hard left is no great loss, losing people like Rosena Alin-Khan was foolish.
I am not sure who Foxjr2 voted for in London, but it wasn't going to be Labour because of Gaza. Its not just Muslims who couldn't stomach Starmers position. I see the Greens have benefitted in a number of places yesterday.
If she runs the election close that's evidence enough in and of itself, but with anti-ULEZ, anti-Gaza, general anti-Khan malaise and only a 5% margin of victory last time (with a FPTP voting system this time) its absurd to suggest her chances were so low.
What people are telegraphing here is they really don't like her at all, or want her to win, so don't want to give any other narrative other than she's a totally hopeless cause lest it give her some momentum.
We see similar with Trump posts on here and you should absolutely never bet like that.
Of course the underlying landscape will change, the Green vote has grown in specific wards on the specific issue of Gaza to sit atop a base Green vote and that may not be long term enough to establish a longer term shift.
I think in the same way that LD might position themselves to challenge an unpopular Labour government in Hull seats in the future (and there is a history of a LD/Labour interface even if it is not prevalent now).
All bets are dynamic. They exist in a market.
NEW THREAD
Against this there has been a clear swing against the Tories nationally, so that won't have helped Hall, even if Khan polls poorly. I suspect a third of the vote in London will be for the other parties, with poor shares for both Hall and Khan despite being FPTP.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhbaXx_ao2Y
And then tried composing my own songs on www.udio.com through prompts.
Not difficult to see how we could soon have an alternative spotify catalogue of music created entirely by AI.
My question is how close does the result have to be if your Hall bet loses at 10-1 for you to feel that your assessment of value was right? Or how big a win does Khan have to get for you to think you made a mistake?
Laying Khan at 1.03, as CR did, seems a reasonable value bet, simply because this is an election that can be competitive - Conservatives won not so long ago - even if this time it *probably* isn't. And although the polling wasn't that close, there also was relatively little polling and last time the polls weren't that accurate. And 1.03 is very short.
There is a small chance of almost anything happening. But that chance is rarely 5%.
A batch of a thousand 10/1 bets includes hundreds that should be about 10/1, a few that are perhaps as low as 5/1, a few others that might be as big as 50/1. Each sample produces winners.
By drawing a single winner out of the sample, you cannot know if you had a 5/1, 10/1 or 50/1 type bet.
IanB2 thinks Hall is not value at 19/1. Would he think he got that wrong if Khan wins by 2%? I think he probably should - do you really think that he would be wrong to make any attempt at assessing his judgement once we know the results?
But against the background of Hall being a hopeless candidate and the Tories being deeply deeply unpopular - such that a lot of voters who may not even know who the mayor is will have voted against them - her chances of winning were never 5%.
One of the main reasons bookies win money, is punters have a big win, over assess their abilities on the back of it and then go on to lose it all back and more.
The best assessments of whether bets are value is with sample sizes where you can test things to a high degree of confidence. The rest is mostly fluff and opinion.
It certainly wouldn't be a surprise.
But I'm still curious about how we can judge IanB2's statement that 19/1 on Hall is not value. Personally, off the top of my head without doing a massive amount of research, I'd want more than 20/1 to back Hall. But at the same time I wouldn't be rushing to back Khan at 1/20, so it's hard to say.
We now have a House of Commons out of kilter with this changed landscape now the Tory’s own Brexit - if they both match after the General Election, to what extent does that become the norm as well?
Cheltenham for example, no Conservative councillors left, at what point do they win the parliamentary seat back?
We have more than enough results now to test this hypothesis. We’ve had >2000 results, which the largest chunk being Lab/Con contests. What do we see? Almost every Lab/Con contest won by Labour last time has been held by Labour. There have been at least 2 Con gains, but that’s a tiny proportion. The Conservatives gaining from Labour is clearly very, very, very unlikely.
That’s my baseline. Conservatives won’t win seats from Labour. But, sure, there are other factors to consider.
There’s a change in the voting system. However, no London mayoral election has ever been determined by second preferences. Khan last time, and the time before, won on first preferences and with second preferences. So, that doesn’t suggest FPTP will matter much. Indeed, if anything, I would guess FPTP harms Hall more because of the rise in Reform UK support.
Anti-ULEZ malaise? The test of that is the Uxbridge by-election, which saw a 6.7% swing to Labour. Add a 6.7% swing to Labour on the 2021 result and you get… oh, a large Khan win. And ULEZ has certainly become less of an issue since then.
Gaza? Sure, that could hurt Khan, although it won’t mean votes going to Hall, and Khan being Muslim himself and Hall’s Islamophobia could be factors that reduce any Gaza effect.
And then we have the polling! The polling ranges from a massive Khan victory to a small Khan victory. The polls were off last time, overestimating the Labour vote, but the polls were pretty accurate in prior mayoral contests. Even if you take the 2021 polling error and apply it to the 2024 polls, Khan wins.
So, for Hall to win, you need a greater polling error than ever before, *and* you need the national swing to Labour to go in reverse. Given that, I think your estimate of a 15% chance for Hall to win is ludicrous. Estimating unlikely things gets difficult, so maybe you can make a case that she’s got a 3% chance, but I don’t see it.