Bid to slash bet machine stakes wipes £1bn off bookies’ shares
‘Prevent addiction’
MORE than £1billion was wiped off the value of Britain’s biggest bookmakers yesterday following indications that ministers will slash the maximum stake on ‘crack cocaine’ gambling machines by 98 per cent.
Shares in gambling firms tumbled after the Daily Mail revealed yesterday that the maximum stake on controversial fixed odds betting terminals (FOBTs) is set to be cut from £100 to just £2.
William Hill’s shares fell by almost 13 per cent, wiping £370million off the firm’s value. Shares in GVC, which owns Ladbrokes-Coral, and in Paddy Power Betfair also slid. In total, the value of the three firms fell by more than £1billion.
Whitehall sources said Chancellor Philip Hammond had accepted the case for taking dramatic action against FOBTs, which currently allow gamblers to stake £100 every 20 seconds.
Mr Hammond is still in talks with Culture Secretary Matt Hancock and Number 10 about how to fill the £400million hole in the public finances that would be produced by cutting the stake to £2. Sources said this was likely to result in higher taxes on other forms of gambling.
The action goes far beyond the advice from the Gambling Commission, which suggested maximum stakes could be as high as £30. Officials have considered a variety of lower alternatives, including £20, £10 and £5. But Mr Hancock has been pushing for the most radical option of slashing the maximum bet to just £2.
Bookmakers, which make an average of more than £50,000 a year from each machine, were lobbying for the stake to stay at at least £20.
The Campaign for Fairer Gambling urged ministers to press ahead with the crackdown, saying said: ‘The evidence shows a low maximum stake to be the most effective way to prevent addiction.’
The Treasury declined to comment on ‘speculation’. But a spokesman said the department was ‘fully supportive’ of Mr Hancock’s work ‘to ensure the UK’s gambling regime continues to balance the needs of vulnerable people, consumers who gamble responsibly and those who work in this sector’.