Betfair hits its two millionth customer

A civil servant from Linkoping in Sweden, Bo Ohrman, wrote himself into the company’s history books after opening an account in September and putting a small wager on John McCain to become the next President of the United States. Betfair was founded eight years ago and stated that the Swede then went on to have a flutter on Wall Street - Up Or Down? And won himself a VIP weekend in London for himself and a guest.

“You have to back yourself in life and when my brother showed me the site I could see instantly that it gave me a wide range of choices and I could pick my own odds,” said Ohrman. “It’s certainly more fun betting on Betfair than it is betting on the stock market at the moment.”

Betfair revealed that it handles an average of five million transactions a day, which is more than all of Europe’s stock exchanges combined, with 99.9 % successfully completed in less than one second. It also handles 4.7 billion page impressions every week and will be presented with its second Queen’s Award for Enterprise on October 20.

“In a year when we won a Queen’s Award for International Trade, it is fitting that Betfair’s two millionth account comes from outside the UK,” said David Yu, Chief Executive Officer for Betfair. “Our international customers are already an essential part of our business and they are growing larger in number every day. So, congratulations to Ohrman, he’s joined the world’s biggest online betting community.”