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.
Open Source
Continuing my theme of getting more involved in sports rather than just trading them I am headed of to Royal St’ Georges today for the final day of the open golf. I’ll be able to see what it looks like at source. I hope it doesn’t rain too much.
No mobile phones or PDA’s allowed on the course, so no greensiding possible! I’ll just have to enjoy the day.
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Betfair down, again!
Just two days before Betfair are due to impose massive increases in costs on their users, they face yet another major outage on their site.
You just can’t really believe it’s possible to get much worse PR for Betfair, but somehow they manage to pull another shocker out of the hat. It’s really quite incredible. You think the least they could do was quickly put a message up on their service page.
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Open golf – Best trades
For a full list and other lists, visit the forum.
The Open has been brilliant so far. The highlight today was the hole in one by Tom Watson, amazing. When my shoulder is better I’m getting out there again to reduce my handicap. It’s inspiring to see a 61 year old holding his own against the worlds top golfers.
This is the last list now as we turn our attention to specific golfers for the remaining two days. The …
Big moves
I thought the first day of the Open Golf at Sandwich would be interesting and that’s exactly how it has proved. For a full list of movers visit the thread on the forum.
Golf has really grown on me as a trading sport and the small gap between the leader-board and oblivion creates some fantastic opportunities. With a £10 stake this is what you could have greened up for on the top movers at the end of day one. …
Repeating patterns
Sometimes the markets surprise me, but more often than not they don’t. After 11 years of doing this, even the surprises don’t seem surprising any more. But yesterday I got a surprise.
Yesterday, last year, I traded a race at Catterick and got a really cracking result from it. A year later at the same course, on the same day and on the exact same race I got the same result. You would think it impossible that such a thing …
Open Golf – McIlroy drift continues
Now the Open championship market is firming up, I’m interested to see the drift on McIlroy is still continuing. I had factored in a bit of a drift but it’s interesting to see how strong and maintainted it is. At the moment the market and likely conditions are perfectly set up for a good trading market.
While zipping around the net I found this good preview for the championship. A good overview and some food for thought: –
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Life in the old dog yet
OK, So I know I said I wouldn’t post these any more as they will lose their relevance soon. But I couldn’t resist this one after a good day yesterday.
Mondays & Tuesdays in the summer can be really tough so it was a pleasure to do well yesterday. Today looks a bit better on the racing front. So if you had a stinker yesterday don’t worry, today does look better. I did get a bit lucky yesterday, so it’s …
The Open Championship
Had my first really detailed look at the Open today. McIlroy has drifted a bit since my first casual glance and that makes for a much more interesting market.
I tend to have a good go at the majors unless there is a very short priced favourite, so the drift on McIlroy is welcome. The weather forecast is mixed for later in the week so that increases my interest. I will probably be heading over to Kent on Sunday so …
British Grand Prix
By the time you read this I will be tucking into a Bacon Roll at Silverstone, home of the British Grand Prix.
I’ve been determined to get to more sporting events this year rather than just sit at my desk looking for an opportunity, so I am pleased to confirm I am fulfilling that obligation so far this year. I was going to the Open Golf, because it is in the south this year. But given recent events I think …
Practice makes perfect
I thought I would make this post to remind people to upgrade / try the latest version of Bet Angel. I’m motivated to highlight this by the fact that only a portion of our users base have upgraded at the moment according to last months figures.
As a reminder, we recently introduced a very comprehensive practice mode in the latest release of Bet Angel, version 1.28. You can see more about it here: –
The practice / training / …
A year after leaving
A very interesting post from Ex Betfair man Mark Davis has appeared on his blog this evening, worth a read: –
https://www.markxdavies.com/2011/07/04/a-year-after-leaving/
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7/7
Not much to add above the post I made a couple of years ago.
https://www.betangel.com/blog_wp/2009/07/07/
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Lack of liquidity
Low matched bet turnover, gappy prices, lack of depth in the market. Yes, I am sure you are familiar with these problems. But I’m not talking about Betdaq, I am talking about Betfair.
Back when Betfair started the markets were pretty thin, but I still saw opportunity in them. As people began to develop techniques to squeak a few quid out of these markets things improved. As traders joined the market and improved liquidity, bigger backers and layers started to …
Jelly
A long time ago I worked for a company where the MD had a great idea. A quick way to boost profits was to levy a new charge for delivery. He asked for comments.
“Jelly” I responded. Everybody thought it was an insult not piece of insight. But my point was that like squashing Jelly, new charges wouldn’t lead to the problem being stamped on, it would just lead to the problem oozing out elsewhere in the business.
Imposing the …
June
June turned out to be a very good month in the end and much better than I expected. It was the best June I’ve had for a few years. How useful to have a decent send off as it were, given the news from last week.
The highlight was obviously Royal Ascot and that contributed the bulk of things for the month. As I have done for a little while, I used both exchanges during Ascot week and this has …
Well done Djokovic
Well played and and excellent job so far this year. A remarkable season so far, I wonder what heights he will reach this year?
I managed to call the final just right as it was easy to read and conformed to most entry and exit points. Wimbledon has been great this year. It’s probably the best tournament I have traded in terms of results and very few mistakes. This is rare, as you expect a few howlers through a grand …
Wimbledon 2004
I’ll never forget the Womans final of 2004 when Sharapova defeated defending champion Serena Williams. It was really the first big win I had on Tennis, which I had traded infrequently up to that point, so it was a bit of a watershed moment. Would be nice to get a result like that today but I’m not going to bet on it! Should be an interesting final though. Kvitova was tipped up to me early on in the tournament but …
Meanwhile
OK, I’m still digesting the news a bit. But while I do that, there is still some great sport on.
The two Wimbledon semi finals are priced around the same level, 1.58 for the favourite, but we have two different contests IMHO.
The head-to-heads tell a different tale: –
Djokovic should be favourite, sure, but Tsonga leads Djokovic 5-2 in head to heads. Though this is the first time they’ve met on grass.
Nadal should also easily be the favourite …
Betfair premium charge & earnings soar
As we are all aware now, Betfair pleaded poverty and an imbalanced business model again yesterday, when announcing another new charge. This time hitting consistent earners for up to 60% of their profits. We heard the similar stories for data charges, transaction charges and the premium charge part one and all the other various amendments over the years to their charge structure.
This didn’t stop them from announcing record revenue and earnings a few hours later. Earnings per share are …
Good end to the month
A surprisingly strong end to the month continues with good performance on Saturday. Unless I mess up on the final few days it should be a good month. Wimbledon continues its great run of throwing up wonderful opportunities. I think this could be the best grand slam I have seen for opportunities. Maybe I have just been in the right place more often than not?
Mondays and Tuesday can be weak in the summer, poor quality racing, only two cards …
Feast or farce
Not difficult to choose what to do this afternoon. Yes there was some racing on but when end up with 15 minute gaps and one race at Pontefract had just two runners, though curiously this was the best race of the day for me.
Over at Wimbledon there were quite a few decent matches and opportunties so it was this that held the main interest for me today. As a point of interest, if you want evidence that people are …
Betfair confirms CEO to quit
“After ten years with Betfair, and nearly six as CEO, David Yu has informed the Board that he believes it is now the right time for the company to start looking for his successor. He does not intend to renew his current contract (which expires in October 2012) and therefore the Board will now begin a search process for a new CEO. During the process of identifying his successor, David will remain fully committed to the Company and to delivering …
A week full of opportunities
We are now just beyond the half way point in the year. So double what you have made so far and you end up around your annual total!
Glad I am sat here and not half drunk on some beach. OK I lied, but any regret at not getting sun burnt has been tempered by some fantastic results in the market this week. I’ve really picked up speed in June and I am heading for a great month overall. Despite …
Betfair poised to replace chief executive
Interesting report in the Telegraph which popped up late last night.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/
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Back to earth with a bump
In line with my objective to take more time off this year, I had a well timed break after after Royal Ascot to head off for a BIG wedding abroad. What a fantastic experience it was and how I wish I could have extended the trip to the post wedding bash on the edge of the mediterranean. Wimbledon was calling though, so I had to make do with what was a fantastic few days instead. We packed so much in …
Tennis – Grass vs Clay
What statistical evidence is there to support the differences between grass and clay court Tennis?
Yesterday we highlighted some ATP data that told you the difference in how much shorter a point is on grass. Winning a point on grass is an average of 1/3rd the time on clay. My first instinct on reading this statistic was that a match on grass must be shorter than on clay.
Ever curious, I downloaded and analysed ten years worth of grand slam …
Grass is for cows
Wimbledon is the only grand slam on grass, but it wasn’t always that way. Two other tournaments were played on grass on the grand slam circuit. The US Open, was played on grass until 1974, and the Australian Open, was played on grass until 1988.
Very few players would not admit that a win at Wimbledon would be a career defining moment. But it’s not through trying that players fail; it’s generally down to how each surface plays. Research by …
Bounce
As this post got buried on the blog the last time I posted it, I have reposted.
I’ve been reading this book recently and it resonates with me. Of all the things I have done in life I have maintained most wasn’t talent, just hard work and lots of practice; but maybe that is how you acquire talent? I’m learning to play the piano at the moment. I’m rubbish, but getting more ‘talented’ everyday.
If your desire is strong …
Final day of a busy week
Well done to Rory McIlroy who continued to rip through the US Open. Unfortunately this scuppered my trade which needs a competitive field to work. At 1.40ish this leaves only one possible strategy, to back or lay McIlroy. I reckon most people will lay McIlroy given his blow up in the US Masters. It’s a clear fact however, that the error most people make is to take past trends and extrapolate them into the future. Rather than go on gut …
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