"Winning here!" : Why Political Betting ramped up the tension over Clegg's prospects

A guest post by an anonymous contributor

News has reached Scot Goes Pop that raises troubling new questions over what has been going on behind the scenes at the Political Betting website. Allegations have been made that the editorial team led by Mike Smithson have steered their readers towards bad value bets with bookmakers - and it now appears that one of those betting firms has handsomely compensated Mr Smithson for his "advice".

On January 26th 2015, deputy editor "The Screaming Eagles" posted "Interesting market, my money is on Clegg and Salmond" in regard to this betting heat -

Which of Cameron/Miliband/Clegg/Farage/Salmond will achieve the lowest percentage vote share in their seats in the general election?

Nick Clegg 4/6
Nigel Farage 11/10
Ed Miliband 25/1
David Cameron 40/1
Alex Salmond 50/1

The idiocy of this "tip" was apparent to any half-clued-up gambler, as several immediately pointed out; Farage was a much bigger price to win, and was doing worse in opinion polls in Thanet South than was Clegg in Sheffield Hallam, and so the then Lib Dem leader was obviously a "false favourite" in the market. Farage was the shrewd bet at 11/10 (and as it turned out was the only leader to fail to win his seat, as well as recording the lowest share of the vote, therefore "winning" this bet). 

A couple of people offered The Screaming Eagles much bigger odds than 4/6 on Clegg as a private bet, but despite claiming it was "a good bet" and that he had backed it at 4/6, he declined to follow up at EVEN money.

Why was the deputy editor of a betting site giving such obviously poor advice? Why was he claiming to have had such a bet but refusing bigger odds? Only a blind man could fail to see that something was up...

...because something WAS up.

By chance, a PB poster's flatmate was a trader at the betting company concerned, and so, over a pint, he casually enquired into how the Politics markets were going, and specifically, how much money they had seen for Clegg at 4/6?

"Not a penny" was the response.

Strange, the PB deputy editor had claimed his money was on at this price. Anyway, more to the point, surely Farage was the value. Which joker at his company put Clegg in at 4/6?

"Oh the bloke who is advising us on the markets for the GE is a bit of a political shrewdie apparently, we are paying him a fortune. A fellow called Mike Smithson."

Mike Smithson of Political Betting? Surely not???

Surely "OGH" wouldn't be making markets for a huge sportsbook, and getting his deputy to advise backing the "false favourite" on his site? Wouldn't that rip the integrity of any betting advice on "PB" to shreds? How would it be, for example, if a suspicion lingered in the air that Scot Goes Pop's positive views on the likelihood of Scottish independence were not actually the true opinion of the author, but a ruse to attract business for his paymasters?

When called out on his claim to have taken the 4/6 on Clegg, The Screaming Eagles panicked, threatened to report the trader (whose name he didn't know) to the betting authorities (even though he had done nothing wrong), frantically deleted posts and finally banned those who queried the matter from the site, with full backing from Smithson to the amazement of other regular thread writers and site staff who were puzzled by the Stasi-like moderation.

How can a website that employs these tactics be trusted to give impartial advice? Is Political Betting nothing more than a front for Mike Smithson's more lucrative activities? There are shrewd betting contributions from a couple of leader writers but, in light of these revelations, how can anyone know for sure how to distinguish the signals from the noise?