07/11/12

2012 US election spread betting results

It was a night of mixed fortunes for punters who stayed up late to trade on the US election throughout the night in the UK.

Betters were able to speculate on a variety of markets with online City bookmaker Spreadex, including spreads on the number of Electoral College Votes Barack Obama and Mitt Romney would receive overall and in different states.

On the day of the election, Spreadex offered an Obama Electoral College Votes spread of 296-300 to Romney's 239-243, with an Obama/Romney ECV Supremacy spread of 55-59.

The binary spread for Obama to be the Next President - making up to 100 for a win and 0 for a loss - was 78.9-84.6, compared to Romney at 15.4-21.1.

One punter lost more than £200,000 after gambling on Obama having a poor night and receiving less than 290 votes in total.

However, another client made more than £50,000 by correctly calling Obama’s victory on the company’s fixed odds betting prices.

Spreadex spokesman Andy MacKenzie said: “We had a number of clients who stayed up all night to bet on the voting and even had customers who made money before the election took place due to volatility in the prices caused by Obama’s handling of Super Storm Sandy last week.

“Yesterday morning our traders had been predicting an Obama victory by between 57 and 61 votes. We didn’t see too many buyers at that price so it’s fair to say his eventual winning margin came as a surprise to most punters.”