Arbitrage Sports betting

Hi Terry,

Im a profressional gambler
I started off a few years ago as a card counter at blackjack but these days i play internet poker.
I tried sports arbing about a year ago.

There are plenty of arb programs you can buy for a low monthly subscription.
I signed up to a uk based company called arb alarm. I think it was about $50 per month.

The software constanly fed me trades and the I had to log into the two bookies and manually place them.

I gave up after a month out of frustration. I made a small amount of money for a large amount of hours.

Large arbs of greater than 5% tend to last less than a minute because there is so much auto software out there.
So most arbs are about 1-2%.
I had to open accounts with about 30 internet bookies and the logistics are a nightmare. Some places take a week to pay so afer you make your 1% that money is locked up for a week and cant be used else where.
Some destroy you profits with withdrawal fees.
And sometimes the browser freezes while you are in the middle of placing the second half of the arb leaving you with a naked position.

Sports arbing is real but im guessing the company has worked out it will make more money by selling the software than by using it because of the logistical restrictions of moving large amounts of cash around quickly between the bookies.

Hope this helps …

Mark.

WJ Hooker, with respect, you might want to research the term 'Martingale System' because this is effectively what your staking plan is.

I do not profess to be a professional gambler, however i have considerable experience in the area of probability, expectation (negative and positive) mostly gleaned from my years as a part time card counter.

Mathematically it is absurdly simple, given enough time for the statistical advantage/disadvantage to kick it, you can ONLY make money by betting into a positive expectation. There is no way around although there are literally millions around that will disagree and will sell you their 'system' for $19.99….

The fact that you keep increasing your bet until you win your $20 stake does NOT make it a positive expectation bet. In fact, if you are betting with the various TAB's and bookies, with their take of around 15%, you are in fact effectively losing 15% every time you place a bet with them! (barring any 'inside' knowledge that will usually manipulate the odds into a prohibitive quote in any case).

Martingale's and those systems closely related rely on one thing, many small wins, and i'll give you that much, if you follow this system you will have many small wins. BUT……. sooner or later you will hit a losing streak that you won't have the capital to overcome, or the bet you are required to make is of such a large amount you cannot get the whole bet on without it either being refused or manipulating the market to a degree where it is a complete waste of time.

I'll say it again, the only way you win gambling is to continuously bet into a positive expectation. For example card counting (dependent on the rules and conditions) is a positive expectation technique. Granted there will be times by either design or necessity you will be betting into netagive expectations, such as when the true count is neutral or negative, but you negate this by placing small, or no bets at this point and you capitalise on the positive counts by proportionately increasing your bets in line with expectation (modified Kelly Criterion). This in turn results in an overall positive expectation.

Progressive systems, can NEVER work unless the bets are PE in the first place in which case you can then use Kelly Criterion to capitalise on these opportunities with far great efficiency than any progressive method.

W J Hooker

Better listen to Bootlace because he knows his "onions". You don't understand probability if you think you can win using your system. There have been documented cases of card counters winning at blackjack because, to my knowledge, it's the only casino game you can put the odds in your favour. But my guess is you still have to be quite skilled at it to win consistently, i.e. you don't read a book and think you are a champion card counter. Added to that, card counters are the exception, not the rule. Casinos also have the right to eject people if they are seen to be using skill, believe it or not, because casino games are supposed to be games of chance (and they are except for blackjack).

As I stated previously, if a person could win consistently they wouldn't give it up. Why would you? Think. There's all the money in the world on tap, and who doesn't want more of it?

Arbitrage Sports Betting?
What next??

That's not investing…that's like some kind of speculating.

C'mon.
You would be wasting your time.

Leave it alone and get back to real estate investing issues!

There was a big expose on them in the Brisbane papers last week. Apparently many of these companies were based on the Gold Coast here in Qld. Most of them are bust and, according to the newspapers; many people/gamblers have lost their shirt. Police raided their offices to find them empty.