Comment: Let’s hope this mega-merger still lets in a few outsiders

Like a bookie’s odds, the share price tells all. Ladbrokes’ 10% surge today says all you need to know about the competition regulators’ green light to its Coral merger.

From some forecasts that as many as 800 shops would have to be sold between them to ease the merged companies’ dominance, the watchdog has gone down to as few as 350.

That’s little more than a divot in the turf at Aintree for a combined chain of more than 4000 shops and will leave them with more than 40% market share. Coming on the back of the Competition and Markets Authority’s similar waving through of BT-EE, and its watery let-off of the banking giants over monopoly pricing this week, you get the impression that oligopolies no longer trouble it.

Anyway, it’s all good news for investors in Ladbrokes. They’ll be owning a massively dominant retail player, with cost synergies to die for.

Don’t be surprised if the £65 million a year savings target turns out to be more like £100 million in a year or so.

As for competition in the retail betting market post the deal, the best the punter can hope for is that one or two buyers snap up all the shops Ladbrokes-Coral have to sell, rather than a fragmented break-up.

A bigger BetFred or Paddy Power would at least even up the field.