Just before the US Elections on Tuesday, one Boylesports punter threw a huge wager at the controversial businessman Donald Trump winning the US elections. It was a massive gamble but with the Republican candidate defying all expectations and landing the win, it was a bet which paid out huge. The person had put €10,000 at 7/2 odds, while €12,000 was placed at 3/1 later.
So big were the lump sums that the bookmaker had to cut the odds on Trump to 3/1, while his rival Hillary Clinton’s was eased out from 1/5 to 1/4.
BoyleSports Spokesman Liam Glynn said on Tuesday, before the elections: “The bet on Tuesday lunchtime is the biggest bet we have seen for Donald Trump in the US Presidential Election and now he is hitting close to a €250K loser in the antepost book.
“It would certainly be the worst political result in a long time for us if Trump manages to win the race.
“After all we did get it wrong with the Brexit outcome, but somehow we still think, or hope that, Hillary will pull through as the eventual winner of the election.”
Unfortunately for the bookmaker, she didn’t. William Hill also reported a big winner on the US Election as they had to pay out $125,000 to a lucky punter. The punter had seen an opportunity when Trump was out a 20/1 to win the Republican Nomination and was 33/1 at the time to win the US Presidency. So the punter went and covered the entire book by playing around 33 bets on Trump coming through.
So The Donald’s subsequent White House win has proved lucrative for some lucky punters and there have been reports of UK-based businessman Vincent Tchenguiz claiming $1.1m (£850,000) after placing a $436,000 (£350,000) bet across two brokers.
“I’m surprised by how everybody is stunned that [Trump] actually won,” the Punter said. Betting site Betfair announced that its biggest overall winner claimed £2m after placing a stake on Trump way back in the primaries. The firm also reported that there was £200m traded, breaking their own record for minutes taken.
Barry Orr, Spokesman For Betfair, said: “The past 18 months have seen some extraordinary things happen in the world of politics and this morning’s Presidential Election was certainly no different.
“The Presidential market mimicked the pattern of a Remain vote in the Brexit market with its confidence in Hillary Clinton, with the Democrat trading at a staggering 93% chance of being elected as the Florida declarations trickled through. When polls closed during the referendum there was a 94% chance of a vote to Remain.
“Trump’s odds officially flipped at 2.24am (GMT), seemingly in response to the Republicans winning the Georgia Electoral vote.
“The market has attracted an unprecedented volumes of bet and, although 60% of the money staked was on Clinton, Trump attracted 54% of total bets.
“Initially this was attributed to bettors being happy to back an outsider because Brexit was so fresh in their minds, however it appears that the opposite was true; the market simply could not accept that the status quo could be wrong again.”
Betway reported that they were paying out on multiple bets of hundreds of thousands of pounds on the result of the election. They have dubbed it Brexit II and there are indications that it is going to be worse for bookmakers overall than the Brexit result and Leicester winning the Premier League as well.
Betway Alan Alger, said: “After Leicester winning the League at monster odds and punters cleaning us out in the late hours of the Brexit vote, we could have done without Donald Trump being given the keys to the White House.
