Member Info for JohnLewis79

Rank x 888 eyeing up a bid for 'distressed' WH at a £3BN cost. Doubts about Rank x 888 merging still persist and a straight reverse t/o might not be the ideal structure. WH are expected to comment today. With the sector dramatically changed from a year ago..see GVC & BWIN, PP & Betfair, Sads/Coral, Tom Cobley & all, it's only little ol Spo that remains unwanted and unloved. How many more mergers/to will be concluded before we even sell our prize asset?

See Willy Hill CEO has been booted out as a result of the underperforming on line business. I wonder who's next? However over at the HMRC ex honcho Lin Homer has left with a pension pot of £2.4M after years of abysmal performance and poor levels of customer service and only securing one prosecution from a list of 6800 UK related Swiss bank accounts. John Mann Labour MP, said the package was a reward for failure, nothing new there! Previous scandals under her watch (Birmingham City council), boss of the immigration system (£200k per annum) where 1000 foreign criminals were mistakenly released, did not dent her upward progress and promotion to the top job at HMRC. G.Osborne paid tribute to Dame Lin....yes gonged!!! saying "she made a real contribution to public service". Bet your regretting those words George! Bloody outrageous! But heh that's modern 'rigged Britain' where fat cats still rule. If I was James Henderson I'd be applying for her post.

Wonder what happened to 'preferred' bidder Hogg? Perhaps he's still scratching around for the odd bob or two? If he's waiting for the vat outcome he could be here in 2017/8. I'm beginning to think he's not the credible bidder we thought, indecision and inaction are rarely good bedfellows. Unless the Pools deal is predicated on the vat outcome and I see no reason why it should be (adjustments to price could be made post result & sale) is it not time the bod drew thus sorry mess to a close?

I hear that lawyers acting for HMRC are charging circa £800 per hour! With the tax payer picking up the tab, who cares? Advice from their legal team will be to fight on whatever the cost. Mind you if I was on the team I would also. Millions must have been paid to the shysters to prop up this total waste of court time and frivolous appeals which go unpunished pecuniaryly or otherwise. Time for some common sense from the appeal court cos we sure wont get any from HMRC.

Still below vat case win on 4/5/16 when the stock traded at 63. Nothing surprising there imo. While the £97m cash pile is in effect in escrow and might never be ours it's best to wait on the sidelines unless you think the stock is a screaming buy? I'm a buyer and will be adding nxt week before the stock hits low 50's whereupon I will sell and incur a massive loss!......Yea right!!

We had it & lost it before.....so still a risk that HMRC will get their way again. Feel it's 90/10 in Spo's favour.

Spo is in the S/cap index of stocks (351-619) which has declined 8% ytd so a bit worse than us. All things considered not a bad result. With the futures looking better for the markets I hope the Brexit volatility and doom'n gloom of the scribblers does not tip us into a bear market. As we stand the All Share is 6% down on the year but still 190 pts above year low.

Well that was a turn up! I guess the question is how generous will Mr Market be this morning? Ftse forecast to fall c 500 so could Spo fall to vat money level?

Remainers 1/4....leavers 3/1. Est £40m will be bet on the outcome.

Remain 2/7...leave 10/3 hence the big rise in the ftse today up 3%+ could be a swing the other way up to the poll on Thursday. If it's to leave hold on to your hats as I've seen 1000 points fall predicted! Great time to be in cash if that happened!

Leavers out to 5/2 and remainers 2/5. Some surveys show a 60% chance of staying in the EU. A YouGov poll resulted in 44% back remain & 43% want to leave.

FanDuel have been thrown a lifeline by New York lawmakers. Yesterday officials voted to legalise the game and once signed into law FD will be able to resume operating. Last week it emerged that FD & DraftKings were in talks about a possible merger which may be in doubt now following the NY bill. Good news for our FS operator DraftDay.

So far 200k are sells with zeroish buys if you believe the nos....which I sure don't. Whether any sp has filterd to the market i dunno but unlikely imo. However in the 'dodgy' lse you never know! As far as I'm concerned the Barrow boys can price sub 50 which will be getting near my avc of 39....Ok that ain't gonna happen unless Xmas is next week and it's my birthday and I've backed a winner at Ascot.

Stay 8/15....leave 15/8. The remainers hardening a tad. My doubts are in...unsure. No doubt many others as well. I think I'm pretty au fait with the issues, pros & cons and I'm still undecided. Neither Cameron or Gove are going to sway me at this late hour so I'll probably vote stay if for no other reason than to leave exposes us to all kinds of uncertainties particularly that the leave camp have not clearly laid out why we should leave and what advantages would accrue? Outside a wish list of what they want/think.... they have no hard economic facts to lay before us other than the grass will be greener this side of the channel, the roses will remain red and our land will overflow with milk and honey. Better the devil you know I say even with the horrors of Brussels and the unelected bureaucrats etc....at least we know what the score is and might be able to effect change?

With the stayers now in to 7/5 soon to be evens I bet Cameron is cursing himself he ever agreed to a bloody referendum which either way has divided country and party. Not much of a legacy Davies boy! Spo now plumbing new depths mainly as a result of bod ineptitude, a doubling from here is very likely as we're worth circa the vat mones so all the rest is in for free. Mr Market is in one of his more generous moods and if you believe the SC are going to uphold the High Courts decision and why would they not....now is a good time to add methinks but be prepared to av down. Well that's what I would do.

Ladbrokes expect to take more than £100m alone on the referendum and with Ascot, the US open golf Eng v Aus and the tennis at Queens it's going to be a betting bonanza! WH reckon they will take £150m this week. Russia late equaliser saved the books £25m....so they say and do not want Eng to fail at the first hurdle! The match v Wales is crucial to England's chances particularly as Russia play Slovakia before the Welsh game. Eng are firm faves to beat Wales who were 6/1 in places!

Stayers at 4/7 and leavers at 13/8. Three polls released yesterday show Britons firmly in favour of leaving the EU and a poll of polls at its strongest level since records began last year. Money managers were betting on the pound falling to between £1.10 and £1.30 and say massive volatility is expected on the result.

Latest the leavers are shortening to 2/1.....the stayers 2/5. Not a betting proposition.

Remain are still around 4/11 and the leavers are in to 9/4 following latest polls pointing to a Brexiters victory. Don't know the poll size or demographic but my guess there are a lot of undecided who will make a decision in the booth on the day...like me, who may swing it the remainers way? Whatever it's going to be close and I just hope there's no fall out come the result, so if it's to remain nothing will have changed but if to leave? Hold on to your hats!

Some good points revolutionary. One hopes the Directors will act in the best interests of shareholders and not at our expense. I'm afraid I have suffered in the past by a bod who sold me down the river so have a jaundiced view on bod motives at the best of times! This may have coloured my opinion on boards in general so here's hoping the Zam board make the right decision. Whatever I'm afraid us pis will be but onlookers.