Paddy Power odds favour Dodds and DUP to retain 30 plus seats

Here’s a nice piece of market making from the entrepreneurial Paddy Power’s odds on a successor to Peter Robinson. Nigel Dodds is 4/5 on, which is probably just about what you might expect for a deputy leader. The boul Paddy says “From a betting point of view it’s beginning to look like a one horse race with eighty percent of the bets placed so far supporting Mr Dodds”. We’ll see if it stays that way when and under what circumstances there is an actual leadership competition.

From a party point of view though, this is good news viz a viz their odds on holding their dominant position in the Assembly next year, given the UCU-NF project is now in tatters, and the TUV dog so utterly failed to bark. You sense several tense shoulders beginning to relax at Dundela Avenue since the small hours of Friday morning.

Here’s the details from the presser:

Next Leader of the DUP

4/5 Nigel Dodds

9/4 Arlene Foster

5/1 Ian Paisley Jnr

8/1 Jeffrey Donaldson

12/1 Sammy Wilson

16/1 Edwin Poots

20/1 Nelson McCausland

20/1 David Simpson

25/1 Robin Newton

Number of DUP seats at the next Assembly Election

3/1 Over 36 seats

5/4 32 to 36 seats

7/4 27 to 31 seats

10/1 22 to 26 seats

12/1 17 to 21 seats

16/1 Under 17 seats

Number of Sinn Fein seats at the next Assembly Election

10/11 Over 30 seats

3/2 28 to 30 seats

6/1 25 to 27 seats

12/1 21 to 24 seats

22/1 20 seats or under

Ends

All prices remain subject to fluctuation.

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