Bet on the French Election - Next President Odds 2017: Le Pen vs. Macron Runoff

With the French Election for President held Sunday, Emmanuel Macron (NOW 1/8) and Marine Le Pen (NOW 5/1) will be heading for a runoff following the big vote.  Betting was available from North America, Europe and the rest of the world via BetOnline here.

A terrorist attack on Friday in Paris may have thrown a wrench in Sunday’s Election.

One police officer was left dead on the sidewalk of the Champs-Élysées with ISIS immediately claiming responsibility. 

From the New York Times:

Barely a week ago, with her poll numbers sagging, Ms. Le Pen tried to rally her base with a raw appeal against Muslims and immigrants. It was unclear if her gambit was resonating. Now she and other candidates are jockeying to position themselves as tough on terror….

Revelations came to light that the attacker was under the authorities radar.

FiveThirtyEight.com declared the race too close to call.  

Through much of 2017, Sunday’s contest looked like it was going to be a race to see who was going to advance to the runoff against the far-right National Front candidate Marine Le Pen. Originally, Le Pen’s most likely opponent appeared to be center-right Republican François Fillon. Given Le Pen’s poor showing in runoff polls, this would have made Fillon a strong favorite to become president. Fillon, though, became the center of a scandal in which he was accused of using public funds to pay his wife and adult children for fictitious jobs. He refused to drop out of the race and plummeted in the polls. That’s when former left-wing Socialist and now En Marche! centrist candidate Emmanuel Macron climbed into a first-place tie with Le Pen and looked destined to end up in a runoff with her.

Over the past few weeks, though, the first-round polls have increasingly shown a jumbled pileup. An average of surveys over the last week1 has Macron at 24 percent, Le Pen at 22 percent, Fillon at 20 percent and far-left Unsubmissive France’s Jean-Luc Mélenchon at 19 percent.

As for the odds, they will likely be fluid and updated in real time here.

The final vote will take place May 7.

- Gilbert Horowitz, Gambling911.com