Vote brings highs and lows for bookmakers

When the polls closed on Thursday evening, expectations for a hung parliament were high, with Britain's biggest bookmakers William Hill and Ladbrokes offering odds of 1/16 that no party would gain an overall majority.

As a convincing Conservative victory emerged on Friday, William Hill acknowledged the betting markets, like the opinion polls, had signally failed to anticipate the result. "People read the opinion polls, took them down to the betting shops and put their money on a hung parliament," the company said.

Betfair, which operates a betting exchange where punters bet against each other, had Ed Miliband as a close favourite to become prime minister an hour before the polls closed.

However, Ladbrokes said punters had been more accurate than the polls in forecasting the Conservatives would beat Labour on votes and seats.

Mr Miliband, who stood down as Labour leader on Friday, had been the bookie's favourite to become prime minister in late April, with punters expecting a Labour/SNP tie-up even if the Conservatives won the most seats. But as polling day drew closer the betting markets swung slightly in favour of David Cameron, with spread betters also backing the Conservatives, but failing to predict a majority.

Both bookmakers, whose shares rose on Friday morning as the threat of tighter regulation under a Labour government disappeared, said the results had been a mixed bag for them.

While punters lost out by betting heavily on a hung parliament, the bookies paid out to those who put their money on David Cameron to become prime minister.

Ladbrokes said it had paid out £2m to backers of a Conservative majority and that it had made a net loss on the election. One person in Glasgow had bet £30,000 on a Conservative majority, winning £240,000.

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Labour had promised to give local councils powers to ban highly profitable fixed-odds betting terminals - touch screen gaming machines found in high street betting shops, dubbed by campaigners the "crack cocaine" of the betting industry.

A total of £25m had been wagered on the outcome of the election, according to William Hill, more than double the amount bet on the Scottish referendum but far below some estimates of as much as £100m.

With both Labour and Liberal Democrat party leaders resigning on Friday, attention has now turned to betting on their successors.

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