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I see that over £400K was bet into the tote on Mondays non-descript meeting at Windsor via the French PMU. The first opportunity that French punters have had to bet on UK racing this way.
Although early days this is a very encouraging sign, and with other countries soon to come on board via co-mingling tote pools, now is the time for racing to grasp the nettle and get hold of the Tote so that all its profits go to racing.
If the Tote can become part of British racing and they manage it correctly. I can see the Tote proving to be a massive income stream for British Racing in a few years time.
Just think if they reduced the take out from the Tote and therefore encourage serious punters to use it for more than just the Scoop 6 what massive pools could potentially be generated with the help from co-mingling, for even everyday races.
Look how much is bet on even the most ordinary race on Betfair. If the Tote could have an 7% takeout rather than the current 13.5% for win bets and could generate similar pools on each race (500k-1M) then the figures are staggering.
Will they grasp the nettle though?
The tote are certainly halfway to grasping the nettle here and halving deductions on co-mingled races.
They’ve slashed the deduction on their will-pay displays on Irish racing to 10%! The trouble is they still actually take 20% deduction. For example, a ten horse race with equally bet horses would show as will-pays of £9.00 (8/1) on their info screens. When you come to collect you’ll get given £8.00 (7/1).
This follows on from displaying false inflated will-pays on their place pools, by not applying this rule to their will-pays but applying it to final payouts:
If, for any reason, the calculated place dividend on any horse falls below 70p,
money will be taken from the net pool on the remaining placed horses
in equal shares to ensure that the minimum calculated dividend on any placed horse
is not less than 70p. The balance of the net pool will then be divided equally amongst
the other placed horses.Nothing has been done to update the will-pays to reflect this rule, which I have been complaining about for twelve years now! As a result they will often show place dividends of, say, £4 if the pool was closed now, when the reality would be, say, £2.
Does anyone actually regulate the tote in this country? The Gambling Commission’s touch seems to be very light when the tote knowingly peddle this misinformation to their hapless clients, suggesting payouts that are vastly overstated and pure fantasy even if no further money enters the pools.
If the Tote is sold off to private industry then any chance would be gone. Co-mingling works both ways – foreign betting money comes in but also UK money goes out. With the Betfair and bookmaker charges and the reluctance of bookmakers to take a bet then an on-line Tote with competitive charges has a chance. The money, if any, the Tote currently puts into racing though is highly opaque.
In 2008 the Tote total turnover was Eu 395M and tax to Government was Eu 3.1M (0.78%) and percentage to racing (3.3%). Hardly worthy of their advertisement boast.
Bookmakers was Eu 10676M and tax to Government Eu 160.1M (1.5%) and percentage to racing (0.9%).It is not a matter of efficiency when the Tote turnover is so tiny. If they doubled the contribution to racing it would only get us back to where we were in 2009. The chances of suddenly doubling turnover in a recession are about nil. Are the people who use the Tote takeout sensitive in any case? Professionals do not use the Tote as the dividends are not fixed and large bets win back their own money. More markets mean less spend per market – the betting cake is finite. There is not any army of bettors holding back until newer markets arise.
coincidentally this piece by Alan Aitken is in today’s SCMP:
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Elsewhere at the conference in Sydney, Australian betting operator Tabcorp revealed itself ready to go to 20 hours a day of commingled pools.
The volume seems to have been turned down on commingling for Hong Kong Jockey Club recently and we can only guess it is trapped in some government backwater when there had been optimism that a positive announcement would be made any time about now.
Australia will become the latest nation to ramp up commingling as Tabcorp’s Sky Racing television channels lift their overseas broadcasting to 20 hours a day, seven days a week within a year.
Simulcasting with Singapore is already being trialled in addition to the current South African and New Zealand commingling and British and Irish racing is under starter’s orders, to be followed by Canada and the US.
If, in commingling as in most market situations, there are "squatter’s rights" – an advantage to those already in place over any new entrants to the market – then Hong Kong is giving an ever-growing start to its rivals for the billions of dollars floating around in export markets.
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