888 and William Hill will survive a No Deal Brexit, GVC & Flutter maybe not

We now have 30 days until markets understand that a No Deal Brexit is inevitable. Last night, the Internal Market Bill that the Johnson Administration introduced last week to override the Brexit agreement with the European Union, passed an initial vote in Parliament by a 76-strong majority of 340 to 263. Even though there was some Tory opposition to the bill, it is nowhere near enough to stop it.

What the Internal Market Bill does is eliminate EU oversight from Northern Ireland completely, allowing a leak of goods into the EU via the border with Ireland. Despite the full frontal mainstream media assault on the bill emphasizing all the former prime ministers and others who have come out against it for breaking international law, it appears that in a practical sense, the existing oppoisition is insignificant in a practical sense.

If the bill passes – and there is little reason right now to think it won’t – then it may be the end of the United Kingdom as we know it. Scotland is likely to vote on independence again now with a solid majority supporting independence in the latest polls. Wales may follow with an independence referrendum of its own. I’m not saying independence and the breakup of political unions is a bad thing. Most of the greatest nations in the world over the last two centuries have declared independence from the U.K. in one way or another.

I am saying rather that you may not want to be invested in U.K. gaming assets as this political dissolution reaches its climax. Any existing market order is built on the assumption of background stability, which no longer exists in either fundamental or political form.