|
AOL users split on
hurricane betting
 54%
say hurricane betting is allright; only 7% of those
AOL users who voted have placed a bet online
American Online asked
Friday morning if it is wrong to bet on where storms
will hit?
With a total of
14,308
votes tallied just
after 8 am EST, some 54% said it is not wrong.
The other 46% had voted that it is.
"We had to wrestle
with it,"
BetCRIS.com (See
Web Site Here) CEO, Mickey
Richardson, told the Miami Herald earlier
this week. "Some people view it as a morbid
thing to offer. But we can't stop hurricanes.
There's been true interest in it from the public.
WagerWeb.com (See
Web Site Here) CEO Dave
Johnson concurs.
"We wrote a total
of close to 1,000 wagers (on hurricane betting),"
Johnson confirmed.
That is 1,000 more
wagers than would have been written during an
ordinary baseball season, which is traditionally a
nonevent in the world of sports wagering. And
these bets were taken prior to the 2006 Hurricane
season even getting underway. By industry
standards, this is already a highly successful
offering.
The press this has
generated will continue to fuel hurricane betting as
well.
"The concept of
offering hurricane betting is much the same as the
media offering nonstop coverage of approaching
hurricanes and placing all their top reporters smack
dab in the middle of these storms when winds are
hitting 100 miles per hour and up," commented
Christopher Costigan, President of Gambling911.com.
"The public is fascinated by hurricanes the same way
they are with a good Hollywood film. And just
like a good Hollywood film, most of us want to see a
happy ending. Suggesting that online gambling
websites look to profit off of a hurricane's
destruction is a little far fetched. No online
gambling websites I am aware of promote odds on
deaths or damages."
"I'm not looking to
profit off destruction, believe me," said
Richardson. "I guess there's a thin line between
what's appropriate and what's not and I'm trying to
stay in that gray area without offending people."
Based on the AOL
voting, this would most certainly appear to be the
case.
It should also be
pointed out that the multi-billion dollar online
gambling industry was among the first to contribute
aid to Hurricane Katrina relief. A number of these
companies contributed a percentage of profit to
these efforts.
The intensity of the
last two Atlantic hurricane seasons has triggered a
mini-frenzy this year of storm-related bets online,
where gamblers can make so-called "proposition
wagers" on anything ranging from "will life be found
on Mars?" to "who will win the next presidential
election?"
"Betting is funny.
If there's enough things in the news, people want to
bet on them," Johnson told Michael Christie,
Reuters.
The average hurricane
wager has come in around $25, which is typical for
these types of proposition bets, including such
offerings as American Idol and Sopranos betting
odds.
And media reports have
helped to create dramatic line movements as well,
according to Johnson.
"When Wagerweb released the odds we were writing 3
to 1 money on the 'Over' (Over 21.5 named
Storms/Hurricanes, Over 10.5 Hurricanes (74+mph).
However, when National Weather Service announced
that there would be 15-16 named storms a whbole lot
of money came back in on the under. That's the
main reason our current odds are 21 under -160, 10.5
under -160.
"It shows a good example of how people bet based on
the media. The weeks
heading up to the National Weather Service
predictions were doomsday and
people bet 'over'. The days since people have been
betting under more
frequently.
"The numbers we handicapped were very high compared
to season averages. We opened them high because we
knew the media would fuel the story and people would
react with betting 'over'. I woul d have to assume
the 'under' money being played is from sharper
players who realized Wagerweb.com inflation of the
numbers was done expecting 'over' money to be
played."
The AOL survey also
revealed one more startling result that demonstrates
the online gambling industry is still relatively
untapped despite taking in billions of dollars.
Only 7% of the 14,284
people who had voted by 8:00 am EST Friday morning
said they bet online.
----
Gambling911.com News
Wire
Originally published
June 2, 2006 8:47 am EST
|
