Ian from the Football Trading System came up with five matches today, which I have added to the Tipster League entries:
Saturday, 17 December 2011
Late Tipster League Entries
Weekend Winners
Here, in order of standings in the Tipster League, are this weekend's selections. Geoff's Draws already had one winner last night, a fluked 2-2 draw!, and his full list is:
Friday, 16 December 2011
Blip Or Trend?
Thursday, 15 December 2011
Sacrifice And Betfair Q3
Fulltimebetting's latest post included this:
I once saw an interesting blog piece that stated that it would take you 7 years to train as a lawyer and give yourself a good chance of an income yet when it came to learning about making a living from sports trading/betting it seems people are unwilling to invest more than 7 minutes. This situation is of course exacerbated by the fact that if you do a Google search of Betfair money making schemes you will see pages and pages of get rich schemes that “will only cost you £37 and you better hurry as there are only 17 places left". All utter bollocks of course but people obviously buy them as they are still out there.I read something similar yesterday, which was:
If you want to become a lawyer, you should study law. If you want to be a doctor, then study medicine.So if you want to get rich from betting or trading, study the markets. Later in the book - Zero To A Million In 12 Steps - the author writes about the need to sacrifice. "What are you willing to sacrifice in order to become rich?" - essentially you need to give up your time in order to achieve success. Your £37 can buy you access to some ideas perhaps, but you'll have to do some work for yourself at some point.
The most interesting piece for me was the qualifier in the Betfair announcement yesterday was that revenue is down when income from "high rollers" is excluded. Surely the "high-rollers" haven't taken their money and gone to play elsewhere? Why would they do that? Oh! Wait a minute...
Good to see that people are spending less on the games.
LONDON (SHARECAST) - Betfair, the online bet-matching marketplace, says increased appetite for placing bets from mobile devices and a strong start to the football season contributed to a small increase in underlying group revenues at the half-year stage.
The group, which has had a torrid start to its life as a listed company, with a number of high-profile managerial departures, said underlying group revenues were up 1% in the half year to the end of October, compared to the same period of last year.
Underlying revenue for the period was £191.3m versus £188.5m the previous year, but this excludes income from “high rollers” achieved last year; when this figure is included Betfair’s revenue is down 10%.
Betfair claims its strong underlying performance has continued into the third quarter “with core Betfair revenue up 13% against the prior year”.
Adjusted, underlying earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) came in 36% ahead of the previous year with profits after tax up 43% at £20.6m.
Not all is rosy in Betfair’s garden, however. Its online games business has seen revenues slow due, Betfair claims, to a reduced marketing spend.
Overall, games revenues were down 5% in the second quarter compared to last year.
Betfair’s poker product is up 3% year-on-year in the second quarter.
Betfair has been particularly affected by a the introduction of a licensing framework for Games and Poker in Italy where it has decided to suspend its operations.
Betfair’s key product is its “Exchange” which, instead of offering bookmaker odds to punters, allows customers to bet against each other. This, it claims, offers them a better chance of winning because they receive more competitive odds, although the benefits of this for winning punters are reduced by Betfair's commission. The company said 28% of clients are in profit for the first half of the year and have received 7% better match odds on their wagers.
Total value of bets on the exchange is up 7% year-on-year on the half-year and 11% over the second quarter.
Betfair admits in today’s release that the exchange “cannot fulfil all betting needs and to be a leading sports betting operator we must offer customers a full range of products”. The company says it is developing its non-exchange offering.
The company has also announced the temporary appointment of its current Chief Financial Officer Stephen Morana, as the group’s interim Chief Executive until August 2012, when Breon Corcoran, formerly of Paddy Power, will take up the reins.
The current Chief Executive, David Yu will step down this year, he said today: “I have thoroughly enjoyed my time at Betfair. When I started back in 2001, we were a small team of just 40 people in London generating revenues of around £400,000 and are now the largest betting exchange in the world, with 2,000 employees and revenues of nearly £400 million.”
Shortly after the open in London Betfair was trading up 2.39% at 832.47p. Over the year to date Betfair’s share price has fallen 16%, over the last five years the firm is down 48%.
Wednesday, 14 December 2011
Shackles And Treacle
Loving the blog, wish I could find something interesting to say amongst the stats haha anyway....I'm interested in the Super Pc comments, I assume from that, that you have a very efficient percentage on your trading....I have been paying PC since the v start, but am presently at 23% so don't have to pay....have you any plans to churn....I would have thought with things like the xx that wouldn't be a problem, my percentage has really improved since doing outright draw bets that at the mo are breakeven but over a large amount of bets!Churning is great in theory, but the problem is that I am so far in, that the logistics of churning enough to make a dent in my Gross Profit / Commission Generated percentage (currently at 7.03% - the number Betfair use for determining Super PC) make it impossible. The regular PC means that the Total Charges stay at around at least 20%. Yes, the football bets do help, but the majority of my wins come from in-play trading where losses are small and wins a lot larger.
A second comment on my last post, later removed by the author so I shall keep it anonymous, was:
you are serious? you are going to keep your betfair account when you get slogged more than 50% of all profits? I can think of many alternatives that would instantly double your profits - your best trade ever.but then of course fails to offer any of the "many alternatives" that supposedly exist. If the Super Premium Charge rules were in place when I started this venture,, then yes, I would have had time to prepare for it, but to change the rules and find that to my surprise, the marathon has turned into a sprint, and I am rounding the last corner, makes it impossible to do much about. When I cross the line though, I will still be allowed to run another lap, only this time I'll be running through treacle, and wearing shackles. As I wrote before though, 50% of something is better than 50% of nothing. The liquidity on other sites simply isn't there, at least not now, and cutting off the nose to spite the face isn't a useful plan.
A couple of Unders came in yesterday, Genoa v Internazionale (0-1) and Koln v Mainz 05 (1-1), although Football Elite tipped Koln which dented the profit a little.
The entries are in for the free competition to predict the date of this blog's 333,333rd hit, and they range from as soon as December 22nd to as far away as February 3rd. Consensus falls on December 28th. Given that my Free Betting Systems post from three years ago is my second most popular all-time, you will understand why I was expecting quite a deluge of entries for a risk-free competition. In the end, it was more of a trickle. Strange how the same readership are on the one hand looking for an easy win, yet are unnecessarily cautious when presented with a genuine well-intentioned offer.
Tuesday, 13 December 2011
NBA Countdown
Better late than never. The cloud in the silver lining is that the Super Premium Charge will now be triggered that much sooner. My historical daily average is almost 50% higher during the core NBA season months of November through March so I figure I have about three months remaining before I am hit, and then it's a brand new ball game. Taking all the risk, and handing back 50% of winnings is tough to swallow, but as I have written before, in the absence of viable alternatives, making £100 and ending up with £50 is still better than making nothing, unless the new hourly rate drops below minimum wage of course.
Scott Ferguson generously included a link to the Betfair Academy Handbook in his latest post. The handbook is well worth a read, with some good advice towards the end, although nothing that readers of this blog will be unaware of, but this caught my eye since it backs up my comment from a couple of days ago about being more likely to find value at Preston North End v Stevenage than at Real Madrid v Barcelona.
Always assume someone has done more research than you. Someone, somewhere will have spent hours or even days studying all the form and statistical data they can get hold of for this event. On a Monday night Premiership football match, you might be betting against 20,000 people. Do you honestly think you are better than all of them? The bigger the event, the more likely it is than somewhere knows their stuff better than you do.Written in 2006, and updated for 2008, the handbook makes a brief mention of the Premium Charge with
Betfair will never close down winners – we only take commission from net winnings*. How much you can get set for depends on other customers and your trading ability.The asterisk explains that "Premium charges may apply to a minimal number of customers". It should actually read "How much you can get set for depends not so much on your trading ability, but on how much Betfair can squeeze out of you before you call it quits". There's also this:
Do some homework - work out which bookmaker is good at certain events, for example the less popular football leagues. You could spend months working out who the best judge is on the English Premiership, but the matches are so popular and the exchange markets so tight, that it is very hard to make it pay as a ‘trader’. The smaller and less popular the market, the more time you have to prepare.I do realise, by the way, that my focusing on the top five leagues in Europe could be seen as ignoring this advice, but in reply, I would say that I do not look at these matches as a trader, although on days like yesterday when my Under 2.5 bet on Chelsea v Manchester City went down to a late penalty, perhaps I should start!
Incidentally, if you've not read Scott Ferguson's interview over at Centre Court Trading, check that out too. A fascinating insight from a former Betfair insider.
"Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune." - Jim Rohn
Sunday, 11 December 2011
Pullover Achieving
The recent performance of the Green Pullover's draw selections is worthy of mention. After a losing run of twelve, he has now hit six winning draws from the last seven selections, with only a 94' goal for Torquay on Friday night spoiling a 100% record. After 71 selections in total, an ROI of 19.3% is very impressive.
The latest table is included here, with additional columns showing the Longest Losing Sequence (LLS), at least since I have been following, and the positions from last week:
Griff can't buy a winner right now, with another two losers this weekend, while Football Elite's came up empty from two Sunday selections - Atalanta and a lay of Bayern Munich.
The Random Draws picked up one winner for another small profit for the weekend.
The table leader right now is Back The Lay The Draw Selections, which is really quite amusing. A low number of selections though.
Geoff's Draws are second with an ROI of 50.4%, also impressive, but with only 26 selections, more time is needed before we get too carried away. Being realistic, not negative - this is from Zero To A Million, another poorly written book but it was free on iBooks!
Studies at the National Institute of Health which examined the link between our body and our mind shows how positive thoughts and emotions like love and appreciation trigger one set of biochemical reactions to the body; and negative thoughts and emotions like criticism and anger trigger a different set of reactions. It was proven how biochemicals were the physical manifestation of thoughts and emotion.As badly written as the above is, the message is correct, and included here because it has meaning for traders. The more you trade, the better you get, with the right mental attitude. Practice makes perfect.
Once your thoughts and emotions become habitual, they forma neural network that keeps the mindset habitually in place. It keeps you, literally, on automatic. That's why when you master a habit, like riding a bicycle or tying your shoe, you don't have to think about it much any more. You've mastered the habit. The neural network is in place, like a groove in a record.
The mindset and its neural network continues developing and becoming stronger with REPETITION and PRACTICE.
Chelsea v Manchester City tomorrow, and my prices are H 2.52, A 3.0 and D 3.71. Betfair's prices at the time of writing are very close at 2.58, 3.0 and 3.55 respectively. I have the under priced lower than Betfair however, at 1.85 versus an available 2.14.
Los Blancos v Los Lilyblancos
The draw part of the XX Draw Selections has gone cold with the three matches from yesterday finishing 1-0, 2-0 and 2-3 with all winning goals scored in the second half - in the case of Lecce v Lazio, as late as the 87th minute. I would like to retract my comment of a few weeks ago where I said that
in a way, it's more satisfying to pick a 0-1 or a 1-0 game than it is to fluke a 4-4 winner.The strategy of backing the Under 2.5 goals on these selections is now slightly ahead on ROI for the season, at 14.6% compared with 11.1% for backing the draw.
The Green Pullover had two draw selections yesterday, and both were winners. After 69 bets, the ROI is at an impressive 13.5% with two more games today.
Geoff's eight selections were down to seven after a postponement at Forfar, and hit two of those seven. The ROI dips slightly to 50.4% from 26 selections.
No 'Game Of Two Halves' selections this week. Not sure if this is a permanent move on Pete's part, as there was no mention of it in the Premier Betting Newsletter, but I wasn't a big fan of the strategy. Credit for looking at an unusual angle though.
Football Elite had a comfortable winner in their first selection of the day, as Koln were all over Freiburg, but his selection of Real Madrid in El Classico went under despite taking an early (first minute) lead. Premier Betting chose this game for their free daily tip which, rather unfortunately, was
First Goal of game to come after 23 minutes 11/10 (2.10) Paddy Power- it happens.
Now I can see the appeal of trying to find a winner in a big match, but I do question how likely you really are to find value in such a high profile match as El Classico compared with say Preston North End v Stevenage, as Green Pullover did in picking a solid 0-0 draw. There are a lot more eyes looking at every angle of the former than there are on Preston - I suspect. Your friends might be more interested in your opinion of El Classico, but your bank doesn't care where the winnings come from.
More matches today and further updates and the updated league Table after they are finished.
Saturday, 10 December 2011
Competition Time
Here are the selections for this weekend's football. Friendly Tipster League leader Geoff goes with:
This blog is now approaching 1/3 of a million hits and to mark the occasion, I'm offering a can't lose deal for my loyal readers. Guess the date when 333,333 will be hit, and win a free £333.33 Betfair bet on anything but horse-racing or dogs! Or you can break it down into three bets of £111.11. If the bet or bets lose, you lose nothing, but you win nothing either. If your bet wins, I'll keep a third, but two thirds of the winnings are yours.
E-mail the date of the 333,333rd hit to me with your PayPal e-mail address by December 13th to be qualified. XX Draw Subscribers (and family members) get three entries. In the event that there is more than one winning entry, the £333.33 will be divided by the number of winning entries. Go.
Friday, 9 December 2011
Pulpable Error
Back in March 2009, I wrote about a book I had purchased called “The Football Betting Science” which in fact is anything BUT about taking a scientific approach to football betting. Written by Gary Christie, in my opinion the book is very poor. As I wrote previously, it’s the sort of book that upon completion leaves you with the feeling that you could have written something just as good, if not far better. It’s not even a book really – more of a booklet or pamphlet, 93 pages, and only that many because the typeset size (Palatino 12/16) is enormous and as large as any books you might find in the Large Print, special-needs, section of your nearest public library. I don't hang out with too many librarians - too wild for me - but apparently Large Print is defined by that group as print that is at least 16 points in size. It works out at about 330 words to a full page. The book is simply just not very good, but I was nevertheless re-reading it the other day, and Chapter 12 “Draw No Bet” leapt out at me. The opening paragraphs are:
If there’s one thing I can’t stand, then it’s sitting on the fence. If you are going to put your money down then make sure you are confident enough to nail your colours to one mast, otherwise don’t have a bet at all. If you fancy a team to win, they could do so 1-0, 2-0 or 7-0. The scoreline doesn’t matter as long as the result is right. However in my own opinion there is no real point in backing the draw. Even if you think you have covered all bases and no matter which way you look at a game it looks even, DO NOT put money on the draw. If two teams look inseparable then leave the game well alone.And that, believe it or not is one whole page of the book, (10p that page cost me!) and in my opinion, one whole page of drivel. The next page starts off no better:
If you were researching a game and thought it might finish level, you may on occasion end up being right about the result and think “I could have made a profit there.” But don’t get tempted too often. Sometimes you might have backed the draw in a game which was 0-0 for ninety-odd minutes but then one defensive lapse or one piece of brilliance from a forward resulting in a late goal ruins your bet totally. It doesn’t matter that you were nearly right. It’s all about the end result and that you got it WRONG. If you are betting on games finishing level, you will lose a lot more than you will win, I promise.
One reason football is unique, and probably one reason why the American’s hate it, is that a draw is a very likely result. In league games, there doesn’t have to be a winner. For some teams, a draw is a good result but when betting it certainly is not. You can never rely on the draw. You are being too exact in your prediction when you say a game will definitely finish level.
No matter what the circumstances are you can’t even get close to a guaranteed draw.I must have been in a good mood when I read this first time - most likely it didn’t really resonate with me at the time because the draw was of no special interest to me – but some of the writing suggests a complete lack of understanding what betting is all about. In fact, most of it does really. It’s actually not until we get to Chapter 14 that we read this: “
Another vital part of choosing the right bet is getting value for money."No kidding, Sherlock.
"If there’s one thing I can’t stand, then it’s sitting on the fence". Is the man clueless? A football match has three possible outcomes – a Home win, an Away win, and a Draw. How is backing one of those three options ‘sitting on the fence’? For a value seeking bettor, the talk about nailing your colours to one mast is nonsense if it means you can only select two of three possible outcomes. You sit on the fence if all three outcomes are priced correctly. If one of the three outcomes is value, you should back it. Yes, even if that value bet is the draw!
“However in my own opinion there is no real point in backing the draw” – in my ‘own’ opinion, your ‘own’ opinion is wrong, and the vague ‘real’ in “there is no real point in backing the draw” suggests to me that the author realises there might actually be a point, but that he is just missing it. There is a point – sometimes the draw is value. It’s as simple as that. To blithely write “DO NOT put money on the draw” is bullshit. (My language is getting stronger the more I think about this. Apologies to any ladies reading this.)
Of course finding draws isn’t easy. Finding value isn’t easy, and we all understand that in betting nothing is guaranteed, but backing the draw when it is value to do so is a good strategy whatever Mr. Gary Christie might say. This line of thought certainly isn’t unique to Mr. Christie though, and for those who understand value, it’s great that the draw continues to be unfashionable.
It certainly changes how you watch matches though. Even as a neutral, it’s almost impossible not to be wanting one side or the other to win, at least to some degree, and you get some strange looks in the pub cheering misses at both ends when it’s 0-0, and then becoming a fan of the trailing team until they (hopefully) tie the game. If they then take the lead and you become a die-hard fan of the opposing team, you’re in danger of being considered very strange indeed.
“If you can't annoy somebody, there is little point in writing.” ― Kingsley Amis, Lucky Jim
Thursday, 8 December 2011
Prospect Theory
What do you think are the biggest mistakes that new traders make when attempting to become successful?and my answer was this:
A couple of mistakes come to mind, one in the preparation, the other in the execution. One is over confidence. Too many people seem to think that profitable trading is just a matter of sitting down at the PC and that somehow the funds will simply roll in. They think that in a sport like horse-racing (something I never touch by the way) they have an edge over insiders and full-time traders with years of experience. Really? Optimism is good, but so too is realism. The other is the need to let winning trades run and cut the losing trades short, whereas the tendency is to do the exact opposite.Referring to stocks, and thus not all of the below applies, a Meir Statman (what a great name) wrote in "Investor Psychology and Market Inefficiencies"
"In summary, people trade for both cognitive and emotional reasons. They trade because they think they have information when they have nothing but noise, and they trade because trading can bring the joy of pride. Trading brings pride when decisions turn out well, but it brings regret when decisions do not turn out well. Investors try to avoid the pain of regret by avoiding the realization of losses, employing investment advisors as scapegoats, and avoiding stocks of companies with low reputations."The topic of the pain associated with losses and the pleasure associated with gains is an interesting one. If you read up on Prospect Theory, you will come across a study by Tversky and Kahneman which in 1979
...found that contrary to expected utility theory, people placed different weights on gains and losses and on different ranges of probability. They found that individuals are much more distressed by prospective losses than they are happy by equivalent gains. Some economists have concluded that investors typically consider the loss of $1 dollar twice as painful as the pleasure received from a $1 gain. They also found that individuals will respond differently to equivalent situations depending on whether it is presented in the context of losses or gains.Controlling the emotions that make us want to lock in that small profit and avoid a loss (regardless of whether it is value to do so) rather than let the winning trade run, is definitely one of the biggest keys to becoming a successful trader. Minimise the losses, not the wins.
Tuesday, 6 December 2011
Weak End Update
The weekend's football schedule is finished, and a late (85') goal for Fulham meant it wasn't the best of weekends for the XX Draw Selections, as they finished with no winners from five selections, falling to an ROI on the season of 16.4%. A profit on backing these as Unders though, with three from five finishing Under 2.5 goals. I thought I had a winner on the Under 2.5 goals in the Everton match too, only to return home and find that my back (the first money in the queue placed earlier in the day at one tick higher than available) hadn't been matched.
The star of the weekend was undoubtedly Geoff (again) as he found four draws from his eight selections, and no 3-3 flukes this week - every winner finished 1-1. If Geoff can keep this up, he will be lifting the League trophy in a few months. Here's hoping he doesn't end up like Ronnie Wallwork in a few years.
All of the above are in the Green. Still in the Red are Game of 2 Halves and Griff's Draws with the Random Draw Picks propping up the table. It would be embarrassing if they were beating any of us.
Until Sunday, I'd not had a golf bet since September, but with Tiger Woods returning to form, I took a chance and ended up making a little over £300 as he won his first tournament in over two years. The NFL was profitable at the weekend too, and after a losing first day, the month of December is off to a decent enough start, but the best is yet to come, with the NBA back for us on Xmas Day with no less than five staggered games. There really is a Santa.
Responsibility And Reality
I know from personal experience that you do not need a large bank to succeed in trading. To make money, you need either an edge or a run of good luck, and runs of good luck are just that – runs – and runs based on luck, both good and bad, come to an end sooner or later. It is my opinion and that of at least some others, that John had a run of good luck, which ultimately ran out after about seven months. John’s problem, as I see it, is that he refuses to accept this reality, and still to this day thinks his winning days were not down to luck, but were down to an edge that apparently only exists when the bank size is above a certain level.
Anyway, I wanted to pick out a few of the questions asked of John, and comment on his answers, not because I have anything against John, but because I think that represents a lot of people out there.
Q How would you describe your style? Would it be fair to say you are a gambler rather than a trader?Here we go again with the ‘stability’ thing which makes no sense. The way you get from £100 to £1,000 is the same way you get from £1,000 to £10,000, from £10,000 to £100,000 and so on. Where is the logic in believing that an edge only kicks in when you have a certain bank size? It’s nonsense, as his assertion that “I've had no option but to go this route. Something I'm hoping will change ASAP.” No option? How do the majority of self-made millionaires make their money – from winning the lottery or from building up slowly and steadily? Yes, people do win the lottery, but I hope that not too many people are relying on this in life. As for John hoping this ‘having no option’ will change, it’s all down to him. He makes it sound like he is the victim of circumstances beyond his control. Take responsibility.
A I am very much cautious once I have stability, although this year I've been trying to build my bank through gambling and that involves taking more risks. Not the way I prefer, although I've had no option but to go this route. Something I'm hoping will change ASAP.
I had quite a bit of success in 2010 which started from £500 in February that year. Trading is the only real way forward although I sometimes like the odd gamble when I'm confident of how things will go. Where I've gone wrong this year is I've not had the bank size that was available to me last year, so I've been trying to gamble my way forward and it's not really worked.Where John has gone wrong, is in thinking that bank size matters, and in trying to gamble his way out of the doldrums. It’s not a surprise that this approach has “not really worked”.
Q You seem to bet on a lot of different sports. Most experienced gamblers / traders, will say that you should specialise in 1 or 2 sports. What would you say to that?A look at John’s blog will show you the diverse events that John involves himself in. In the opening nine days of May for example, John bet on Australian Rules, Baseball, Basketball, Boxing, Cricket, Horse-Racing, Golf, Snooker, Football, Tennis, Rugby League and Rugby Union.
A I will cut down on one or two once I get the bank size and stability I need. Although this was how I was successful initially so there will not be any major changes. I'm comfortable trading on most sports.
John does at least recognise the need for an edge when he says “I want to avoid the likes of horse racing as I feel I have no edge or knowledge and will never compete with those who have access to the result before I do.” Horse-racing? Hang on a moment, didn't he... well, that was back in May. Maybe lessons are slowly being learned. The truth is that many sports John trades or bets on are ones where he is unlikely to have an edge.
Q Many people have commented that they think you don't have an edge and that you hit a good spell but now things have evened out with a bad spell. What is your response to that?John’s mention of ‘outside matters’ is more support for my assertion that to be successful, you need to be in the right frame of mind, and not have other issues in your life. An unsettled emotional state leads to distraction, mood swings and poor decisions. And anyway, what is a ‘big bank’ that will bring stability? It is a relative term for a start, (when I started, £500 was a big bank for me, then £1,000, but a bank that size today I would consider small [for me]) but whatever your bank size, if you have ‘outside issues’ or no edge, you will lose a ‘big bank’ just as easily as you will lose a ‘small bank’. Besides, John himself essentially admits this is nonsense when he says
A I've not had 1k+ in my account since March, and that's how I was successful initially. Big bank brings stability and confidence and because I'm using a small bank, it's making things difficult. The last 7 months have been unacceptable, but outside matters have not helped my situation as well.
“That's just a figure as an example. £1k isn't going to magically mean that I will start to make thousands again. I just need a big enough bank to get going again, as once I do, I'm quite confident I can do as well as I did in 2010.”Quite confident based on what? Not anything resembling reality, so far as I can see.
Q How did you get started on Betfair and how long was it before you were making big profit?Or was 2010 a year when he got lucky? I would suggest that if this really was a breakthrough year, the year John ‘discovered’ how to make it pay, then 2011 would have seen similar results.
A 2010 was the year I finally discovered how to make it pay.
Q You are a full-time sports bettor. What mistakes have you made and what advice would you give to anyone thinking about going full-time?Someone who is unemployed and passes the time gambling is not my definition of a full-time sports bettor, but the Sultan is more polite than me. John then gives some ‘advice’ that is totally wrong. He says
“Always trade out of bets (unless you are doing it for fun) even when you think it's 100% certain, trade out anyway, it's amazing how many times I've thought a bet can't lose only for it to get beat at really short odds 20 minutes later. Trade out of everything, and don't get greedy. You will win that way”.Very poor advice. You trade out of a position only if it is value to do so, not simply because you can. If you think something is 100% certain, why would you trade out at any price and give someone else value (assuming you staked appropriately in the first place, an issue discussed in this blog before, and yes, there are rare exceptions to this rule). If you think something has a probability of .5, would you trade out at a price of 3.0 (implied probability .33)? Hopefully no – because you are giving away value if you do.
And finally, there was this question: Have you been hit by the Premium Charge and how do you feel about it?
John’s answer:
I've never been hit with that. Not sure why.Not sure why.
Saturday, 3 December 2011
A Divine Idea
Anyway, to ensure that kids these days are better prepared for life, the Press Association reports that:
Labour has lent backing to proposals for children as young as 12 to be taught about gambling.Now that really would be a useful 40 minute weekly lesson. As the great George Carlin liked to say, religion is bullshit. An understanding of probability is a useful skill to have in many areas of life.
Shadow Education Secretary Stephen Twigg said pupils needed "information to prepare them for the adult world".
The call came after an industry-funded body suggested secondary schools should teach that studying the form of race horses, dogs and sports teams can improve chances of winning a bet.
In a submission to a government review of personal, social and health education (PSHE), gambling addiction charity GamCare also said youngsters should play the dice game craps and learn about fruit machines, according to The Times.
Detailed lesson plans have apparently been prepared, some of which state as their objective "to enable students to increase their knowledge and understanding about gambling".
One proposes a class discussion in which pupils are asked to identify "some of the more positive aspects of gambling" as well as negative points and to understand why people bet.
Shadow education secretary Stephen Twigg said: "This is something that shouldn't be left to chance.
"With the rise of online gambling, there is clearly a need for children and young people to be given good advice.
"It is right that, just like drug and alcohol addiction, teenagers and children are given information to prepare them for the adult world.
"The Government should listen to concerns from charities and include gambling awareness in the reviewed guidance on PSHE education. This is something that shouldn't be left to chance."
Tenderloin Tech Hub
With last spring's crackdown on Internet poker sites taking bets from U.S. gamblers, you might think online wagering is illegal in the United States.Bloomberg picks up the same story with a few more details here although the number of employees in San Francisco in this article is just 20.
It's not.
A company called TVG is one of several companies offering traditional pari-mutuel betting on horse racing in states where it's legal. TVG was acquired in 2009 by BetFair, a London online gambling firm.
BetFair, which recently opened a tech hub employing about 75 people in San Francisco, is planning to release a product in May that could not only transform betting on ponies but could also save the declining fortunes of U.S. tracks.
Here's the deal: BetFair (annual global revenue of just over $500 million) has developed the exchange concept of betting, in which online gamblers place bets against one another. This is easier to explain when two teams are involved rather than 10 horses, so let's start with a football example: Say you want to bet on the 49ers against the Steelers and want to get 3 points. If there's a bettor who wants to take the Steelers and give 3 or more points, BetFair brokers the bet and takes a small commission from the winner.
The principle is the same with horse racing: If I want to bet on Italian Stallion to win and another bettor thinks Italian Stallion won't finish first, BetFair will broker the bet and take a commission.
Exchange betting isn't yet authorized in California, but a law passed last year will make it legal starting in May, which, not coincidentally, is when BetFair plans to open its online exchange.
Not only does BetFair let racing fans bet against one another, it allows them to bet in ways they can't with traditional wagering.
"You can keep betting in the middle of a race," says Stephen Burn, head of BetFair's San Francisco office. Betting can continue until the results are posted, so "if there's a photo finish, you can keep betting until a result is announced."
BetFair is working with the California Horse Racing Board as well as with race tracks to strike deals that will enable BetFair to earn a profit while offering the tracks a substantial cut. This is how BetFair, if volume is strong on the site, could help save the state's declining horse racing industry.
BetFair is proposing a 10 percent commission on racing wagers, with two-thirds of that going to the track. So if you bet $30 and win, the commission would be $3. BetFair would get $1, and the track where the race is held would get $2. The loser of the bet pays nothing.
That seems like a generous take for the tracks, but BetFair's Burn believes that the proposed split will benefit everyone.
"From our perspective, unless there's a healthy horse racing industry ... no matter how great our betting product is, people won't want to bet on it," Burn said. "You have to have viable, sustainable horse racing industry."
10% is a "small commission"? It's all relative I suppose, but for some, that's a lot. US horse racing is all tote pools, so that 10% would still be competitive there, but would any non-US customers in these markets also be expected to pay the same 10% or would they only be open to US customers? I guess that's what the 20 to 75 employees in the 'tech hub' are all working on!
Friday, 2 December 2011
Simpson's Paradox
The answer to the recent poll question "Player A has a higher batting average than Player B in three consecutive years. When the three years are combined, will Player A always have the highest average?" is, counter-intuitively, No.
This is little known to non-statisticians, but it is quite possible for an average to be higher in a number of individual events, yet when the numbers are combined, for the 'poorer' record to come out on top.
Wikipedia uses a few real-life examples, one sports related, using batting averages in baseball for two well-known DJs. In all three years from 1995 to 1997, David Justice had a higher batting average than Derek Jeter:
Bursting Bubbles
you are completely out of order for this post, you have got me completely wrong. I offer FREE advice, i offer people the chance to watch me trade LIVE in the hope of them picking up tips.So the advice is offered for free! The betting community has found someone yet to make his fortune, who is willing to give away his edge to others - traders who are in direct competition with him - for nothing in return. Well, maybe, but for someone still striving to make 'huge amounts of money', this seems a strange decision. Not many of us yet to make our fortune would, upon discovering a treasure trove, tell complete strangers to help themselves before we had at least grabbed enough for our needs, so excuse my scepticism on this. Maybe the concept of an exchange hasn't been grasped by our friend yet.
Since i went full-time in May i have made over 30k profit fro trading pre race and inrunning. To me that is not a lot of money, as i strive to earn in excess of 100k per year. I can't even be bothered reading all of your drivel you have posted, but i ask you to remove immediately, otherwise i will spout lies about yourself on my blog.
You will soon see once i start updating on a regular basis in January how wrong you are about me.
Now £30k since May isn't too shabby at all. £5k a month in fact, which makes it all the more puzzling that the one screenshot he publishes shows a profit of just £180, taken from what must have been a distinctly average day. Why would you not use a rather more exciting day's screenshot?
The likelihood of a novice stumbling upon an edge in the shark-infested waters of horse-racing trading is also a factor to be considered, and his understanding of percentages is also a concern (how is 110% confidence even possible? - why not be more selective and hold out for the 120% confidence picks?). The numerous spelling, punctuation and grammatical errors are left in place:
I like to find lays priced under 6.0 and i will usually find 1 or 2 each day, not a lot i know, but this is where im using my head and being patient, only laying the ones im 110% confident with. When im laying inrunning i will lay in more than 50% of the races each day, and with these il use an average liability of 3% of my betting bank as the results can be a lot more volatile, still i make a long term profit otherwise i wouldn't do them at all.An edge that is present in 50% of races each day? Impressive. When he was asked for some evidence of this success on the Holy Grail thread he mentioned in a later comment, none was forthcoming and the moderator closed it as a result.
Anyway, everyone knows that the Holy Grail of betting was already discovered by Slicer. Well, except for the fact that it didn't work as detailed here.
And Mr. Daniels has still not added Green All Over to his list of "Daily Websites I Visit" - although I think he means "Websites I Visit Daily"! Criticism of his dreadful English resulted in this comment
well im sorry if im not a posh southerner! I haven' created a blog to satisfy english teachers!Since a blog requires writing, it might be an idea to brush up on basic spelling and grammar first.
It was said of Slicer that he was either:
1. Very, very stupid - so unlikely to be in this postionI hope Mr. Daniels is a new possibility of 4. A very astute and selfless individual.
2. A charlatan - looking to profit from the gullibility of others
3. A smart individual who is attempting to manipulate the market to their advantage
Enough of that - football now, and Griff, to his credit, is back with one draw selection this weekend, which is Wigan Athletic v Arsenal currently at 4.4.
Geoff, of Fulltimebettingblog.com hoping to retain top spot, has cut down on his selections hugely, from 11 to 8, and has come up with the below draws:
And one more blog for the blog roll - BubblesBrian (I have NO idea, and probably best not to ask) sucked up to me with:
Just added a link to your excellent blog. Not expecting you to link back, it's entirely up to you.Well, I took a look, and Bubbles is just starting out -
Love the sense of humor you have and I do hope that I don't get on the receiving end of your scathing wit :).
There are many blogs out there about gambling on many sports but not many that start the journey from the beginning. And by beginning I mean from the day that the idea formulates in their head, and the journey they take.The blog is called "A Gambler's Life For Me" and I have one suggestion for Bubbles (aside from adopting a more masculine name - you ever been to a West Ham game?) which is to read this post!Actually, having just read a little more, I have some further suggestions.
1. Forget about the horse-racing unless you have inside knowledge.
Horse Racing because for some reason that’s the first one that springs to mind when I think of betting.is not a good reason to bet on horses.
2. Use the exchanges. Yes you are liable if your bet loses, but same as you are at a bookies. Just stick to backing until you get the hang of the lay side of it. Your liability is always made clear before you place the bet.
3. What the heck does this mean?
When I finally start my journey with cold hard cash there will be shock at the amount of money I intend to start with, but that’s another post in the future.Don't do anything silly please. Put in the time to learn with pennies and build up slowly. If you can't build up slowly (as I have told O'Dwyer many times) you might as well give up.
The poll on the batting average is now closed, and all will be revealed in my next post.
Thursday, 1 December 2011
By George
George had a comment on the XX Draws 'prospectus' to which I typed a detailed reply only to find that the address was "noreply-comment@blogger.com" so I'll write it here instead since it's not too personal, and might be of interest to others. George wrote:
Hi. I looked at your XX Draws prospectus. Very well written. Good idea with the partial fee refund! I got a bit confused b/n your all-time projected historical and your 2011 actual historical results, but having reread it is sort of clear now. If I understand your mechanics correctly, you are using the lay side of the market and are factoring no commission. Correct me if I am wrong, please. A more conservative estimate of this well performing strategy would based on the back side of the odds (0.05 lower) and will be adjusting for commission. Adjusting your avg odds to 3.43 and assuming 5% commission on your winnings (using your 35% strike rate), I arrive at ROI of 15.8%=0.35*0.95*(3.43-1)+0.65*(-1). I am not saying that this is what should be in the prospectus, but it just helps describe the range of historical outcomes better, depending on how conservative one wants to be with the assumptions.My reply is:
Hi George -
Thanks for your e-mail. With regard to the price I use, when I send out the e-mail a few days ahead, I put in the price from the back side simply because more often than not, this price is matched if you have your bet up for long enough. It's not a target price that you should not take less than, it is just an idea of what you should reasonably expect to get matched at. If I do not get matched at this price, then I record the price that I do actually get matched at, so all the prices you see are matched prices. There was a game about three weeks ago (Novara v Roma) where I quoted 3.65, yet the price then dropped to 3.35, but on the day of the match, 3.65 was matched minutes before kick-off. The draw price doesn't usually move that much but this was a Serie A game, so who knows what was going on! (Roma won 1-0 in the 73' in a game that had the proverbial 0-0 written all over it!)
As for commission, I don't include this simply because many people pay less than 5% commission, but you're right - I should update the prospectus to state this, and I will do so this weekend.
Sorry if the all-time v 2011 results are confusing. Basically, it's only since 2011 that I have been recording the draw price. Previous to that I recorded the match result, but I'm a cautious man and it was only after the returns looked solid after a good number of matches that I was confident that it was more than a blip in the statistics.
Thank you for your input.
Holding That Fort
Two requests yesterday, one asking to join the Friendly Tipping League (request approved, just send me the details for next weekend) and another for a place on the blog roll. I'm a trusting sort of chap, and went ahead and added it thinking I'd check it out later. Then I see Cran The Trader's post written after he had also received a similar request. Seems that this might not be the innocent sounding "new blogger from the trading world!" blog that I assumed.
When I took a look at the blog, I read this: (the numerous spelling, punctuation and grammatical errors are left in place)
After being approached from several wannabe traders, i came up with the idea of setting up some type of mentoring scheme. I would like to teach beginner/intermediate traders the ins and outs of trading betfair.Lessons will be given, you will get to see me trade live, and from this you will pick up tips as you go along. During each trade i will be talking through what im doing, il be stating why im entering a particular trade, and why im exiting.I wouldn't bother if I were you. "After being approached from several wannabe traders..." Really? Shouldn't it be 'by several wannabe traders'? You would think that Mr. Martin Daniels (aka BetfairMagician, marts_uk, RacingExpert, SportsTrader) must be quite famous in the online betting community, (with all those names, he actually is infamous rather than famous!) yet his blog was started on October 18th this year, and is comprised of a total of three posts. The opening post included this:
The focus will be mainly on inrunning trading, but pre-race scalping will also be heavily involved. You will get to see the daily routine of a professional betfair sports trader. Il soon be creating some videos of me trading, which you will have access to.
If you are struggling to make profits on betfair, i can teach you how to win consistently.
If you are interested please email martindaniels_1983@hotmail.co.uk
I feel my knowledge is now that of an advanced bettor. I don't make huge amounts of money, yet, but thats where we all strive to be right?Well, right, but mentors are usually people who have achieved some success in their area of expertise, not just people who are experienced at failing.
Through the weeks i will be posting screen shots and uploading videos of my weekly profit/loss aswell as my best and worst trades of the week. From January 2012 im going to set myself a profit target for the year but until then im taking things slowly and cautiously.There is one screenshot, showing a profit of £180.34. You might expect a "professional Betfair sports trader" to have evidence a little more convincing than that, but isn't it also rather odd that someone who is "professional" one minute, changes his tune the next, admitting that he "doesn't make huge amounts of money, yet".
Anyway, it was a great sales pitch and once Mrs Cassini's approval is received, I shall be signing up. She has one or two questions. I only hope that by letting you all in on this secret, I haven't missed out on one of the limited places available. Oh well, that's the kind of generous man I am. Good luck if you sign up - you'll need it.
Incidentally, I also removed the link, not because of all the above, but because the cheeky devil hadn't even had the decency to include "probably the most well known, well respected and certainly well read trading blog", (that's this one), on HIS blog roll! If you really want to check it out, you can find it in the comments on the last post.
Finally, after being approached from several wannabe Craps players, I came up with the idea of setting up some type of mentoring scheme. I would like to teach beginner / intermediate Craps players the ins and outs of playing Craps. Lessons will be given, you will get to see me bullshit live, and from this you will pick up tips as you go along. During each trade I will be cursing through what I'm doing wrong, I'll be stating why I'm entering a particular bet, and why I'm exiting.
The focus will be mainly on in-running Craps, as pre-roll scalping will not exist. You will get to see the daily routine of a professional Craps player. I would soon be creating some videos of me playing, except that the casinos don't like cameras, so bad luck.
If you are struggling to make profits at Craps, I can teach you how to lose less. Stop playing. I don't make huge amounts of money, yet, but that's where we all strive to be right?
If you are interested send me an e-mail - and money. Thanks.
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