Cantor Gaming & Wagering Ltd. (UK), the betting offshoot of financial services giant Cantor Fitzgerald, has inked a deal to provide financial fixed odds betting for Isle of Man-registered online bookies 188BET. Nigel Singer, 188BET’s managing director, said the financial fixed odds offering would be a good complement to 188BET’s existing product suite, which is renowned for its in-play offering.
In related news, Cantor Fitzgerald Europe has shed its Cantor Index financial spread betting business. Fortunately for Cantor Index customers, the company’s client list has been transferred to St. Albans-based spread betting operator Spreadex, which pledged to honor all customers’ open positions and seamlessly migrate their accounts – usernames and all – over to the Spreadex platform. The move echoes Spreadex’ absorption of Extrabet’s clients a couple years back after Extrabet owner IG Group tired of the spread betting game.
Sticking with the spread betting crowd, investment brokers in the UK have been slapped with a £20m levy to help compensate former clients of four companies that have entered the Financial Services Authority’s ‘special administration regime,’ including spread betting firm WorldSpreads, which collapsed a year ago after auditors discovered a £13m shortfall on the company’s books. In November, the High Court in London authorized a payment of three pence on the pound to WorldSpreads clients, followed by a second payment of five pence on the pound in February. Clients who had less than £50k in their WorldSpreads accounts have been told not to expect anything extra in the way of damages once their balances had been repaid.
