Author Archive: Peter Webb
I left a good job in the consumer technology industry to go a trade on Betfair for a living way back in June 2000.
I've been here ever since pushing very boundaries of what's possible on betting exchanges and loved every minute of it.
Look, no hands…
One upshot of Betfair’s recently decision to increase their rake from more successful users like myself is that I have revisited my love of interacting on the exchanges with spreadsheets.
I have taken some time out from ‘normal’ trading to work on spreadsheets a bit more. This is to see if I can create something that works fully automatically for me where the payoff will now be particularly high as it takes none of my time to execute. When something …
York Ebor meeting
Summer racing isn’t over quite yet and today kicks of the Ebor meeting at York. I’ve traditionally done OK at this festival each year so I am looking for something above average this week. I’m going to give Betdaq a good go this week at York as liquidity is rising and I suspect I can get something decent out of some of these races. I’m keen to get some decent practice in. If you look at my Ebor result from …
That thin line…
Early season football is the most interesting time of the year for me.
Some teams play well but lose, some play poorly but win and in the early season that gives a lift or shock to the team. Teams can easily build or lose momentum early in the season so its key to see how things are playing out. Short term momentum is critical and can lead to early season over performance but to keep it going over the whole …
Betfair’s LMAX loses £13.2m in first year
Betfair’s majority owned financial trading product LMAX recorded pre-tax losses of £13.2m for the year ended 30 April, Betfair’s annual report has shown. Full story: –
https://www.egrmagazine.com/news/
I think LMAX is going to continue to be a burden for Betfair. There are already very good solutions in place in this market and despite the suggestion it’s a new way, most new users have found that the markets are heavily seeded and the fill rates poor. It’s got a long way …
The apprentice
I saw this article in last weekend’s financial times about Ryan Clarke and thought it was a really nice piece. Outside of the elite clubs it was a really nice story of somebody who has worked hard to get through the system from the bottom up. It gives you a good perspective of the difference between the elite clubs how football used to be. Worth a read…
It’s all kicking off!
Yes the premier league is back. Twenty teams, OK maybe four, well maybe three battle it out for the greatest honour in football…. Who will sack their manager first!
As I have mentioned in previous posts the market tends to inefficient at the start of the season. I looked back over the two months at the start of last season to see what happened last year.
The first thing to note is that the market got the number of goals …
US PGA Golf
Positive movers from the US PGA from open to the close of day one. Some big movers in there delivered a lot of profit on day one. It’s been a busy day in Atlanta:-
https://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/golf/14499302.stm
Steve Stricker – 27 to 3.7
Adam Scott – 29 to 23
Bill Haas – 150 to 48
Simon Dyson – 170 to 65
Jerry Kelly – 1000 to 65
Matteo Manassero – 250 to 65
Davis Love III – 190 to 65
Trevor Immelman …
How to win the lottery
Caught this article the other day and it tickled me. I think we all dream of finding a way to make money from things like this. When I was young I dreamt that maybe, just maybe, there was a way to make money from betting on sport, never dreamt it would actually come true!
If you are into this sort of thing then read the book the Newtonian Casino, or watch the film “21“.
A sea of red
Fortunately this doesn’t reflect my betting exchange activity, tepid though it is this week. The title refers to the chaos in financial markets. As a lot of your know I am heavily invested in financials and it’s part of my grander plan to eventually sit on my bottom each day doing nothing. I’ve been actively investing since 1990 and messing around for longer than that. It was gambling that lead me to the great casino of the lot, the stock …
Pity City
That was an intruiguing and exciting start to the the elite football season. This charity shiled final highlights where a lot of people go wrong in trading football matches. At half time a 2-0 lead flattered city according to the stats and Man Utd were still in it. Add in their propensity to score late goals and a back on Man United or the draw screamed value.
Unfortunatley I was not in a position to trade on Sunday, but got …
City or United?
Tricky, neutral ground, key players out, non-descript match, revenge for an FA Cup exit. Many factors in play.
I did a cut of data this morning against similar looking matches. I say similar because I analyse matches on a much deeper level than just look at odds and other top line levels or form. I open up the match and examine what the market is discounting on a number of levels and then recompile it. The neutral aspect of this …
Kick off
The English football season kicked off in earnest last night with Blackpool nudging a 1-0 win against Hull. Today league football gets underway properly and the hopes and aspirations of many will re-ignite across the nation. How appropriate that the financial markets are crashing under the weight of false hopes and huge amounts of debt just as the football season starts up! If you are looking for excess then there is plenty to find on and off the football field, …
Getting better at Golf
In real life and on the markets!
Out with my son again this morning who got his first par today and I managed to get round the whole nine holes on par. Haven’t done that for a few years, one birdie, one bogey. I’m also getting better at understanding the golf markets. It’s taken a few years but I am finally getting under the skin on the markets. It’s proved pretty interesting and it’s also been a bit of a …
Another new strategy
Sat the in bath the other night pondering a number of things. Of all the things I do, looking for new things and trying to solve the puzzles that any market throws at me is the thing I find most interesting.
I came up with a way off thought based upon what I had seen from recent market data. Basically that the market has been tightening and less money than ever is lost to one side of the book or …
Good approach
Looks like it will be the last day before the glorious weather breaks in the UK so went out to play some Golf with my son this morning.
A good approach on the seventh left me in the middle of the green but with a tricky put for an birdie. Almost the perfect put, but the ball stopped just short of falling in the cup. No amount of stomping on the green would make it fall in, so I had …
Horses and hay don’t work
Having exclaimed yesterday that you should make hay while the sun shines it seems that today at least, there is a dearth of hay to be made in the racing markets. Two low quality cards, on a Tuesday and only one race has ten runners or more. Hay doesn’t spring to mind but slurry does. With the sun beating down and the kids on holiday it’s part of afternoon off. I’ll do some work in other areas as well. Racing …
Make hay while the sun shines
You may remember this post from last year: –
https://www.betangel.com/blog_wp/2010/08/16/working-holiday/
With regard to the title, never has there been a more apt phrase for sports traders.
In the Summer there is wall to wall sport and opportunties appear at will. In the winter you are digging around for every penny, but pon top of that you also don’t know what the future will bring. So making the most of it while available is always a sensible move, I hope my …
Betfair sponsor Tuerkiyemspor
If your reaction was “Who?”, you are not alone in thinking that. Visit this link for an interesting angle on why: –
Gooder Goodwood
My old English tutor would have a heart attack with that title!
Had my best day of the week yesterday and should be headed for a great festival overall. The day didn’t start very well with a delayed start and then I got my bottom spanked at Nottingham when I failed to address an alarming drift on the horse I was trading. But from there in things just got better and better. I managed to pull in some really good …
Phone call from Betfair
A few weeks I got a phone call from a number I didn’t recognise. It was Betfair telling me I was now going to pay 60% of my profit to them. Or not as it turned out!
I tagged a name to that number so if they phoned again I would know who it was. Yesterday that number rang again, right in the middle of trading, thanks. What could Betfair be doing phoning me in the middle of Goodwood? Curious …
Not so Good-wood
A fairly lacklustre day yesterday started me off on the five day festival at Goodwood. I didn’t pull anything amazing out of the hat, but ended on a decent amount for the day. I think it ‘felt’ lacklustre because I had such a good start last year. On the same day last year I managed a clean sweep of the entire card, I didn’t manage that this year.
Today promises to be very interesting. The feature race stands out a …
A Glorious week ahead
After some quiet weeks it’s time to roll up your sleeves and get busy again. I have traditionally done well from Goodwood so I am looking for a repeat performance this year. Nothing is guaranteed however, so I’ll roll up my trousers and dip my toe in the water today to find out how warm it is. We targeted this very meeting last year for some really in-depth research and analysis so we will be doing the same this year …
Barney Curley
Always an interesting card when there are Barney Curley runners on it, today we have two. You can follow all the shenanigans and trading opportunties thrown up by Curley runners by reading this thread on the forum.
You may have to wait till 21:00 to see the best opportunity of the day it seems!
For some additional background view this You Tube video: –
Betfair International Stakes
Couldn’t resist posting up this P&L on this race from yesterday. OK I got more on Betfair, a bit, but nowhere near the same when if deduct a 60% commission.
You should always do what is best for you, especially in a trading market, but look at my circumstances. It’s a strange feeling to only be able to earn 40% what others can earn by doing exactly the same thing. I can teach people how to do similar things and …
Football is back (almost)
Scottish league football restarts today and it’s a useful reminder that at the start of season it’s easier to find value than at any other time of the year, bar the relegation dogfight perhaps.
It’s often difficult to see how transfers and all the other summer shenanigans will play out, but that can show itself in some of the earlier matches. Keep an eye open at the start of the season for a few fast starters. Any one of the …
Betfair – Cross matching
Cross matching has slowly been implemented across many sports markets on Betfair and earlier this year on the big one, horse racing.
There are still some odd things with cross matching. Prices for the API and for the Betfair web site are different. This is because cross matching is not exposed via the API. We put the cross matching algorithm into Bet Angel, but quite a large number of API applications still show the ‘wrong’ prices. Betfair also never tell …
IG Index vs Betfair
IG Index released year end results yesterday and they make interesting reading when compared to Betfair. I quite like comparing IG Index and Betfair as they are both spread betting companies, moreso now than ever. Now they are both listed companies, its possible to draw some rough lines around both businesses. Comparisons to IG helped me decide that Betfair was way overvalued when they listed.
Revenues are fairly similar across both businesses but margins at IG are much higher and …
Botfair
I read some comments yesterday evening from some ‘traditional’ punters about how they were pleased Betfair’s new charges were going to get rid of the bots. Unfortunately for these posters, the opposite is almost certainly likely to be true. There is some pretty simple logic behind it.
Say you have a winning bot that makes money on a market and you suddenly face higher charges. At this level you would most likely work more aggressively to make more to offset …
Betdaq boost
Yesterday saw a fairly big boost on trading volume on the horse racing markets on Betdaq, which was more or less running at double last weeks numbers on average. It’s too early to say if this is a sustained increase or just a blip, but it’s encouraging.
I’m not going to tell you to use one exchange or the other or both, that’s your decision, not mine. Everybody is at different stages of their trading. But there are obvious benefits …
60% Premium charge
On the first day of trading on 22nd October 2010 Betfair shares closed at 1550p. At the time of writing this post the shares are trading at 627p or down nearly 60% from that closing high. How ironic!
I don’t want to feed that hand that bites me, to reverse the common metaphor. So, for me at least, action speak louder than words. Whether volume decreases or increases on the Betfair exchange, why will be the most pressing question. Volume …
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