'It nearly broke me': Customers who lost life savings in Football Index collapse waiting for answers

Thousands of people have been left seeking answers, as ITV News' Ellie Pitt reports.

At 7am on Saturday March 6 2021, thousands of Football Index customers hurriedly opened their phones or computers to check their accounts, only to see in their worst fears come true.

Their money was gone.

Thousands - for some, hundreds of thousands of pounds - had vanished in an instant.

“It was just sickening, I actually was physically sick as a result of the fact that the prices of all players, so these weren’t bad bets, all players dropped by 80, 90 per cent and there was panic,” David Hammel, who had been a Football Index customer from 2018, said.

Football Index users were in shock. These were committed customers who had dedicated hours of their time and, for many, life-changing amounts of money, to a product they believed had revolutionised gambling.

But their nightmare was only just beginning. Five days later the company went into administration (later, liquidation) meaning the likelihood of any meaningful amounts being returned to them were diminished.

Football Index called itself the Football Stock Market. Customers bought shares in football players that were bets that a player would become successful, their share value increase and then users could then sell their shares for a higher price.

Shares could be sold to other customers - “traders” - or they could cash out by selling their shares back to Football Index.

There were also cash bonus payments known as dividends, these were paid if players performed well in real life on the pitch and in the media.

David, 51, is a former bank manager who has spent most of his working life in the financial services.

At the start of the 2018/19 football season he downloaded Football Index and put in £30.

“I quickly got really hooked and it was addictive, I really enjoyed playing it. It was a very, very clever concept.”

David's deposits grew and before long he dipped into savings, used redundancy cash and money from his pension to buy shares in players.

When it collapsed, he had put £104,000 into Football Index.

The site launched in 2015 and by March 2018, 65,000 users had deposited money in the platform. By January 2020 Football Index was gaining 20,000 new customers a month.

It was heavily advertised on TV, had segments on TalkSport, as well as shirt sponsorship deals with QPR, Nottingham Forest and Bristol Rovers.

A whole community sprung up around Football Index. Social media pages for users amassed thousands of followers; YouTube creators made tutorials; podcasts were dedicated to it; Excel experts sold spreadsheets; and insiders gave tips on the next up-and-coming players to watch.

Many customers shifted from punters to “traders” who, seeing Football Index’s use of financial markets language and promises of “guaranteed yields” by co-founder Adam Cole, believed the site was an investment opportunity rather than gambling product.

But, like so many businesses, the pandemic caused problems for the platform.

When Covid-19 hit and sporting fixtures were suspended, Football Index took measures to try and keep its “market” stable. It stopped customers from being able to cash out easily by selling their shares instantly back to Football Index.

The bonus payments, dividends, were doubled to try to keep customers happy. But this was expensive for the company and did not bring in new users.

So the company started cutting costs. The workforce was reduced, advertising agreements were withdrawn, director salaries were slashed. But it didn’t work.

In March 2021, Football Index folded and admitted it did not have the money to cover customer funds. Users had £124m worth of open bets in the site.

“It nearly broke me,” Frank Wright said.

"It absorbed all my time; it absorbed all my money" - Frank Wright put £14,000 into Football Index, half of it on a credit card

“I’m on a very low salary and it seemed the only possible way I was going to be able to make any kind of really life changing money," Frank, 42, and a bookmaker for 20 years, said.

"What started off as an initial sort of hobby, absorbed all my time, absorbed all my money,"

Frank put £14,000 into Football Index. But half of that was from credit cards following a suggestion made by one of the company’s co-founders Adam Cole.

In a video clip from a panel event, Mr Cole is met with laughter after telling his audience: “All you've got to do is max out your credit card, effectively, that's your leverage. As long as you can beat the APR on your credit card.”

“His statement definitely influenced me. I mean I can say in hindsight it was silly, but I wasn’t the only one taken in,” Frank explained.

"Max out your credit card" - Adam Cole addresses an audience at a panel event before the firm's collapse

Cole was in charge of Football Index until December 2020 when, as it teetered on the brink of disaster, he stood down as CEO. Mike Bohan, another co-founder, took over the position and was at the helm when it collapsed.

ITV News wrote to both Cole and Bohan requesting a response to allegations made by Football Index users that they mismanaged the company. Neither has responded.

Parliament has been informed that the Insolvency Service is currently investigating the misconduct of the directors.

Paul Carlier is a financial expert who investigates investment scams and actions of industry regulators.

"One hundred and twenty million doesn’t just evaporate overnight, it clearly didn’t have the cash on account or the assets to back that up and pay them out,” he explained.

“It was quite evident that it needed a constant supply of new money to keep going, that’s a classic flag for a Ponzi scheme. It represents itself as an investment but gains are actually being paid from new money that’s coming in, it’s almost like a conveyor belt.”

Football Index was licensed and regulated by the Gambling Commission. But it was a novel product, with stock market features and used financial markets language.

In May 2019 the Gambling Commission approached the Financial Conduct Authority to see if they would also regulate Football Index.

At first, the FCA said yes, but later changed its mind. There were nearly two years of back and forth between the Gambling Commission and FCA about who should regulate Football Index and protect its customers – who during this time were unaware and continued to pour money into the site.

The Gambling Commission told ITV News that the “central product always involved consumers staking money on the performance of football players and as such this product was regulated as gambling".

It said: “Because gambling is a leisure activity and not an investment opportunity its regulation does not extend to continuous, real-time monitoring of the financial health of operators, and neither does it provide significant financial protections should a gambling business fail.

“We appreciate the hurt consumers must feel as a result of losing their stakes because Football Index failed but throughout our efforts were focused on securing the best outcome for consumers within the scope of our regulatory powers.”

The regulator added that Football Index did not apply for permission to allow users to sell their shares to each other.

“This is a feature that sits outside gambling regulation and is something that the Commission would be likely to refuse to regulate in the future,” a Gambling Commission spokesperson said.

An FCA spokesperson said: “We have every sympathy with those who lost money through this collapse. While this was a gambling product and so not regulated by the FCA, we recognise our communication with the Gambling Commission should have been better. We have already strengthened our relationship to ensure we work much more closely with them.”

The FCA admitted that Football Index “gave rise to issues of legal difficulty and complexity for both the FCA and the Gambling Commission".

But we may see more of these kinds of betting offers in the future.

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Indeed the Gambling Commission has said: “The lines between what is gambling and other types of products, such as financial services or computer games, has become increasingly blurred and no longer neatly fit into existing statutory definitions of gambling.”

But added that they have “put new processes in place to pick up on novel products to ensure we hold ourselves to account in an ever-changing environment".

An independent report commissioned by the Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport gave a number of recommendations about how the two regulators should work together in the future and the Gambling Commission has assured ITV News that these are being followed.

The company in charge of the liquidation of Football Index, Begbies, told ITV News: “This is a complex case and as such we are unable at this point to accurately determine when all matters will have been concluded or the level of return to creditors.”

For now Football Index customers are, nearly two years on, left wondering where exactly their money went and if they’ll ever see any of it again.

Help and advice on problem gambling and how to block gambling software on your devices

Gordon Moody - offers residential courses for men and women who have problems with gambling – email help@gordonmoody.org.uk or call 01384 241292 to find out more.

GamCare - offers free information, support and counselling for problem gamblers in the UK. It runs the 24/7 free National Gambling Helpline (0808 8020 133) and al offers face-to-face counselling.

GambleAware - provides information to help people make informed decisions about their gambling.

Epic Restart Foundation - offers activities to equip those recovering from gambling harm with useful and constructive tools.