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A list of the Betfair forum threads about the new premium charges.
A FaceBook group has been created to protest the new BetFair premium charges.
PREVIOUSLY: BetFair impose new “-Premium Charges”-…- Do BetFair gag the critics, too?
I have re-published yesterday’-s BetFair Q &- A at the bottom of my previous post —-because that’-s the post that Google features, bringing in 300 people a day.
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My analysis of this PR debacle:
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A FaceBook group has been created to protest the new BetFair premium charges.
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Here are some BetFair traders’- takes:
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UPDATE:
A list of the Betfair forum threads about the new premium charges.
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The Independent
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PREVIOUSLY: BetFair impose new “-Premium Charges”-…- Do BetFair gag the critics, too?
UPDATE: They announce a Q&-A.
PREVIOUSLY: BetFair impose new “Premium Charges”… Do BetFair gag the critics, too?
UPDATE: They announce a Q&A.
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UPDATE:
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PREVIOUSLY: BetFair impose new “Premium Charges”… Do BetFair gag the critics, too?
UPDATE: They announce a Q&-A.
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PREVIOUSLY: BetFair impose new “Premium Charges”… Do BetFair gag the critics, too?
UPDATE: They announce a Q&-A.
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BetFair’s bet matching process stopped for one full hour on May 7, 2008, and their P.R. people are over-apologizing for it. They are apologizing for the problem, and for their slow response to affected customers —-good move. They are also giving out 10 bundles of ?1,000 each to 10 affected traders chosen at random —-a move I have mixed feelings with.
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OK. Now, the beef.
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During the same period we’ve continually seen record volumes of bets. For example, the value of bets placed on Betfair last week was greater than for any previous week including Cheltenham or Aintree [which are big British horse racing events].
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Nigel Eccles:
How did you forget yadda yadda yadda. [ Hilarious. 
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Nice list, roughly makes sense but lots to disagree with (as you would expect). However one clear mistake is BetFair. They should be valued at $3 billion. They just did a recapitalisation which distributed 10% of the company in cash to shareholders (I got the check this morning). It was at a valuation of ?1.5 billion, so unless you are even more bearish on the exchange rate that works out at $3 billion.
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Henry Blodget:
Thanks for the info on Betfair–-that’-s exactly the sort of concrete detail we’-re especially looking for. We’-ll see if we can confirm, and, if so, the valuation will drop to $3 billion.
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And there’-s another interesting comment, on the other page:
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Insider:
why the gratuitous —- and painfully ignorant – -swipes at the USA?
can’-t you do your job without the silly —- and, again, factually incorrect —- morals lectureds and editorializing?
actually the U.K. is one of the few countries in the world where online gambling is essentially legal (though the U.K. still hasn’-t sorted out all the laws it is creating to govern online betting)
many EU countries are literally at each others throats about how/when to tax internet gambling (principally because state-run lotteries are specifically carved out of the E.U. free trade agreements)
japan, australia and china have sever and horrible and harsh punishments for internet gambling
of course, pretty much all of the islamic world puts people to death or dismemberment for breaking qu’-ran-ic law – and gambling is totally and utterly forbidden under the qu’-ran
it is you who are “-of arbitrary morals”-. stick to blogging.
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Insider’-s comment sounds informed, but he/she should have avoided the nasty last line.
“-Stick to blogging”- is an insult I was served with, recently, (by a UK-based financial trader), so I can relate. But that’-s never helpful. Educate that blogger, instead. You’-ll get a better ROI, believe me.
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SAI 25 Live
Methodology
Current listing
Blog post
SAI 25: THE BETFAIR PAGE
Estimated Value: $5 billion
Business: World’-s largest Internet betting exchange where users can gamble on everything from horseracing to tennis matches.
Location: London, United Kingdom
More Info: About Betfair
CEO: David Yu – [ a US citizen ]
Investors: Index Ventures, JP Morgan Partners, Benchmark Capital, UBS Capital, and Soft Bank.
Analysis: People love gambling, and Betfair provides a safe, simple, and un-sleazy way for them to do it. The company allows bettors to place bets and bookies to arrange them, and it keeps 5% of winnings.
Betfair’-s business is illegal in the United States of Arbitrary Morals, of course (thanks to the gambling lobby?), but the rest of the world isn’-t so uptight. Unlike other British market makers, Betfair has been smart enough not to accept American credit cards, which puts it out of reach of US regulators. We suppose the British government could destroy Betfair with an attack of Americanitis, [????????] but we don’-t see that happening. In fact, their neighbor–-the E.U.–-is reportedly looking into whether or not the U.S. ban on Web betting hurts E.U. companies, and, if so, it might be willing to take the US to the WTO court.
Softbank bought a 23% interest in Betfair for $600M in February of 2006, implying a valuation of $2.6 billion. The company has grown from $10 million in revenue in 2002 to $365 million in 2007 and generated $70M in operating profit in fiscal 2006. We estimate about $500 million in revenue in 2008 and believe the company is worth about 10X that. Thus, we estimate that Betfair is worth about $5 billion.
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Fantastic.
That will help a lot.
Congrats to the BetFair-TradeFair people.
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UPDATE: BetFair’-s valuation will probably drop from $5 billion to $3 billion!!!!
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