Tag: stock market

Original Betfair investor cashes out

Original Betfair investor cashes out

News today that Balderton Capital ‘cashed out’ it’s remaining investment in Betfair.

An RNS notice appeared today showing that Balderton had sold 4,227,170 shares bringing their holding from 4.04% to 0%.

The significance of this is that Balderton were one of the original investors. To quote their website: –

“Balderton’s original investment in Betfair was made in 2000 and it remains one of the largest institutional shareholders post the listing. The partners have been actively involved in the development

25/09/2013 | By | Reply More
Betfair reject £900m takeover offer

Betfair reject £900m takeover offer

Betfair came out this morning and rejected an offer by CVC of 880p per share. With 103m shares in issue, that values Betfair at roughly £900m. Betfair shares closed at 800p on Friday so expect another jump up today.

Mark Davis had some interesting reflections on the offer on his blog. His comments are always worth a look as he is a big shareholder and obviously an insider on the whole Betfair thing. He has often given insight to …

22/04/2013 | By | Reply More
Private equity firm seeks Betfair buyout

Private equity firm seeks Betfair buyout

Last last night SKY news broke a story about CVC approaching Betfair: –

https://news.sky.com/story/1077839/exclusive-cvc-mulls-750m-gamble-on-betfair

I think this would make a good target for a firm like CVC, but whether they can pull it off is another thing; they would require the buy in of all major shareholders. The rationale for a private equity buyout would probably be along the following lines. Betfair is cash rich and a private equity firm would probably use that cash as part of the buy …

14/04/2013 | By | Reply More
Short Betfair!

Short Betfair!

Page seven of the business section in the Evening Standard today. Thought you may want to see it.

Basically they are saying short because of the GC stuff, which we know is not an issue anyhow, so a poor piece of journalism there. But also because the share buyback has supported the price and that is about to end. I’d say that was a better piece of insight.

Overall, It is going to be a big sporting year so I …

24/04/2012 | By More
Betfair results due out tomorrow

Betfair results due out tomorrow

If you can get up early tomorrow morning you will be able to see Betfair’s H1-12 results. The first since the introduction of the most recent premium charge announcement and various other factors. It will be interesting to see what impact all the news coming out of Hammersmith this year has had on the underlying business. It feels to me like growth has slowed, but that they will be able to boost the bottom line thanks to their very aggressive …

13/12/2011 | By More
IG Index vs Betfair

IG Index vs Betfair

IG Index released year end results yesterday and they make interesting reading when compared to Betfair. I quite like comparing IG Index and Betfair as they are both spread betting companies, moreso now than ever. Now they are both listed companies, its possible to draw some rough lines around both businesses. Comparisons to IG helped me decide that Betfair was way overvalued when they listed.

Revenues are fairly similar across both businesses but margins at IG are much higher and …

21/07/2011 | By More
Half price sale underway

Half price sale underway

When Betfair floated I got some stick for saying they were overvalued and they were not a buy. This wasn’t a statement on Betfair’s business or business model, more the price it was selling at.

I first started taking an interest in the stock market in the mid 80’s and five or so years later I started investing. One thing I learnt is that if a company IPO’s and sells some of it’s stock it will do so at the …

27/05/2011 | By More
Betfair set float price

Betfair set float price

Full news release here: –

https://corporate.betfair.com/media/press-releases/2010/2010-10-07.aspx

But here is the important bit: –

“The indicative price range of the Offer has been set at between £11.00 and £14.00 per Share, which is equivalent to an equity value for Betfair of between approximately £1.16 billion and £1.48 billion based on its issued share capital2. This indicative price range is expected to make Betfair eligible for inclusion in the FTSE 250 Index in due course.”

07/10/2010 | By More
Betfair 1/3 for float failure

Betfair 1/3 for float failure

Credit to the forum poster who found this on the Internet but it’s either a wonderful peice of PR or people are actually betting against the float being a success. An interesting read anyhow. Until I see the price and / or the offer document it’s difficult to make a true judgement as to whether it’s too expensive or not.

 

A lot of hot air or will a good float?

 

27/09/2010 | By More
Betfair to float in the autumn

Betfair to float in the autumn

I’m told that according to Sky News today, Betfair are to list on the stock market in the Autumn with a target valuation of £1.5bn. That would be a multiple of 40 times last years earnings which is a significant premium to pay. Betfair appeared to dismiss the rumours earlier in the week during their forum chat.

16/07/2010 | By More
Are sports markets like financial markets?

Are sports markets like financial markets?

Yes and no. There are some similarities, most certainly in a number of aspects. Forex markets are pretty similar in their appearance.  But when it comes to trading certain types of markets, there are many differences.

When I first looked at the markets I thought there may be some commonalities, but I discovered that a number of popular technical indicators in financial markets just don’t wash as well in sports markets. Looking closer, there are some clear underlying reasons for …

10/02/2010 | By More
Stock market vs. Sports market

Stock market vs. Sports market

As many of you know I have a deep background in financial markets and it was this, and a lifelong interest in gambling markets, that brought me to betting exchanges. I thought you may be interested in why I am still active on both the betting and the stock exchanges and the differences I see between them.

At face value, the two markets are not too dissimilar. You can bet on value or price direction on both and betting on …

18/02/2009 | By | Reply More
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