Those that have been longing for a serious competitor to Betfair will no doubt be pleased to hear that Ladbrokes have finally launched their Exchange product.
You are probably aware Ladbrokes had bought the Betdaq Exchange product but it appears that this product will remain unchanged and that the Ladbrokes Exchange will be a ‘Global Betting Exchange’ which will power various front end attachments just like Betdaq. Peter Webb over at Bet Angel explains this and highlights the fact that this is a smart move because liquidity can then be pulled together from various sources.
This differs from the Betfair Exchange model which has attempted to operate solely on their own and are thought to be looking to integrate their own recently created sportsbook area of the business to help with liquidity. Betfair’s sportsbook has been around for most of 2013 though and there’s still no sign of this integration as yet.
Here is a link to the Ladbrokes Exchange promotion page which lists some of the other benefits and key features. I am especially interested to see the instant market refresh functionality in action because slow refresh rates on Betfair’s site is one of the main reasons I myself like to use third-party software like Gruss and Geek’s Toy for trading on Betfair.
With Ladbrokes having their own physical betting shops they will also able to allow customers direct access to their winnings from the Exchange product. This will be a nice advantage over Betfair where customers typically have to wait 3-5 days to get their hands on their cash.
Premium charge payers at Betfair will be pleased to hear that there is no premium charge at Ladbrokes Exchange. This of course doesn’t mean they can simply move all their funds and Betting activity to Betfair as liquidity is required and we’ve seen from Betdaq that it’s not an easy thing to attract.
A quick look at tonight’s Champion’s league matches and we can see that most of the prices are identical or almost identical to Betfair’s with liquidity looking pretty promising. There are some gaps in tomorrow’s tennis matches displayed but the amounts look pretty decent and it looks promising. I don’t think all the liquidity is that of Betdaq as some prices have more available to back on the Ladbrokes Exchange.
It’s clear that Ladbrokes are very serious about developing their Exchange product. They are already a huge brand with a massive customer base and the increased competition should hopefully benefit us all. It’ll certainly be very exciting to see just how the Ladbrokes Exchange progresses.