why i stopped trading and went back to straight bet instead

[ForFolksSake]

[EDIT]

[ShaunWhite]

He's just keeping his fingers crossed he doesn't suffer three in a row

When you bet on thousands of situations a year then these things will inevitably happen. It's just odds, you'll get 3 in a row or you might get 6 in a row once a year . You have to expect it, and you might take 2 weeks to get back from it. So your staking, bank and risk need to be such that it's not a disaster because you know it's going to happen eventually. But equally you'll get runs of outrageous good luck too, so it's all just the fun of the game.

Changes your life perspective too, when you see 1000/1 shots winning roughly every 5 days on average then when you hear there's a 1000/1 change something will happen to you, it doesn't sound especially unlikely. . It still is, but doesn't feel like it is.

[ruthlessimon]

Order flow is a timing trigger, not a reason.

You're kidding right? Markets are supply and demand, and seeing how that is currently vs recently vs normally is a damn good reason to bet.

But as you say, everyone sees things differently, and without that difference markets would be static and we'd all be making nothing. So you do you

(btw, what's a timing trigger?)

sometimes I expect a move but the order flow doesn't really support my opinion, so I'm more cautious with how much I stake and where I position. IF I stake at all.

Other times I have zero opinion but the order flow points the way or throws up an opportunity, this is the ideal scenario for any trader I think (biasless). It's probably more subtle than obvious but it gives me more confidence.

Then comes a time when you're sort of anticipating one thing, but the order flow is adamant that it's trying to do the opposite. Guess who you should listen to there, your ego or the market The stronger your opinion here the more likely you're not going to do anything, which is a massive shame and a huge waste of opportunity!

Inevitably you run into markets where your strong opinions are backed by order flow, and tbh if you only end up with an average result out of those scenarios you probably butchered the execution somewhere.

It all depends on the quality of the trader. Most who are blind to structure/context (i.e. only using order flow as the reason to bet (especially if manual)) will get shredded because they’re always late. Every market wobble looks like a reversal if you don’t have the bigger picture.

Real edge (imo) comes from combining order flow with context. A £10000 back bet on Man Utd isn’t automatically a reason to back Utd. Some vital questions are: Did I expect that £10,000? When did it arrive? How are others reacting? Where are we in the traded range? Did team news just drop? etc. Context turns raw flow into useful information.

[jamesedwards]

Today's "Angle of the dangle" came with a big fat dose of disqualification!

Ffos Las 16:40 - have you seen the 'head on' angle

https://www.attheraces.com/atrplayer-po ... 31755/true

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p13yZAjhU0M

Yes I saw it at the time. I had already bet FPTP in the final few yards, but then the photo betting after the slo-mo was a big clue that it was going to look worse in the head-on. I thought about greening up at that point but didn't. At least I didn't pile in on the photo, that's a mistake I would have made in the past.

Sals 18:43. Very close photo and now a Stewards. FPTP 1.50 to be chucked. This time I greened up.

[Kai]

A £10000 back bet on Man Utd isn’t automatically a reason to back Utd.

To be fair there's never a reason to back United these days

[jamesedwards]

Ffos Las 16:40 - have you seen the 'head on' angle

https://www.attheraces.com/atrplayer-po ... 31755/true

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p13yZAjhU0M

Yes I saw it at the time. I had already bet FPTP in the final few yards, but then the photo betting after the slo-mo was a big clue that it was going to look worse in the head-on. I thought about greening up at that point but didn't. At least I didn't pile in on the photo, that's a mistake I would have made in the past.

Sals 18:43. Very close photo and now a Stewards. FPTP 1.50 to be chucked. This time I greened up.

DQ'd!

Saved me a few grand. Learning and getting better every day!

[ruthlessimon]

A £10000 back bet on Man Utd isn’t automatically a reason to back Utd.

To be fair there's never a reason to back United these days

Goldie blowing another bank chasing orders

[ruthlessimon]

I've always struggled to understand why people don't get why I use the phrase, selling volatility.

At the end of the day, the sum of volatility exceeds the actual outcome, so any excess is up for grabs in profits. That's how I approach the markets.

I always thought your edge came from deploying hundreds of small-stake (logical) strategies and testing them scientifically - which I think is brilliant, the closest thing to pure market research.

But this... ‘the sum of volatility exceeds the actual outcome, so any excess is up for grabs in profits’ ummmm.....

Imo your line explains why an edge exists, but it isn’t how the edge was discovered. The real edge comes from your disciplined testing, not from the principle - which is why saying “I sell volatility” imo is misleading

[ShaunWhite]

Some vital questions are: Did I expect that £10,000? When did it arrive? How are others reacting? Where are we in the traded range? Did team news just drop? etc. Context turns raw flow into useful information.

If you look up Analysis Paralysis in the encyclopedia...

I always thought manual traders just practiced until they could catch a fly with chopsticks. By the time your enquiry has made a determination it'll be dark.

[ruthlessimon]

Some vital questions are: Did I expect that £10,000? When did it arrive? How are others reacting? Where are we in the traded range? Did team news just drop? etc. Context turns raw flow into useful information.

If you look up Analysis Paralysis in the encyclopedia...

I always thought manual traders just practiced until they could catch a fly with chopsticks. By the time your enquiry has made a determination it'll be dark.

Life is all about balance imo. Try & read every tick manually = extinct by instinct. Look for too much context = analysis paralysis.

If the manual trader expects the £10000 they can dive in headfirst on the next tick (i.e. the £10000 is their river card).

If they are unsure they wait.

A manual trader trying to read every tick of order flow will do their brain in & lose to the hft's. They need to play a different game. A contextual game over seconds, minutes and longer

[ShaunWhite]

Some vital questions are: Did I expect that £10,000? When did it arrive? How are others reacting? Where are we in the traded range? Did team news just drop? etc. Context turns raw flow into useful information.

If you look up Analysis Paralysis in the encyclopedia...

I always thought manual traders just practiced until they could catch a fly with chopsticks. By the time your enquiry has made a determination it'll be dark.

Life is all about balance imo. Try & read every tick manually = extinct by instinct. Look for too much context = analysis paralysis.

If the manual trader expects the £10000 they can dive in headfirst on the next tick (i.e. the £10000 is their river card).

If they are unsure they wait.

A manual trader trying to read every tick of order flow will do their brain in & lose to the hft's. They need to play a different game. A contextual game over seconds, minutes and longer

I'd probably conclude that when neither of us are actually any good at trading manually then someone who is would have the answer. I just see people who've delevoped great instincts through years of practice and I'm still not sure what you think they're doing as they learn.?

[Euler]

It's difficult to conceptulise things sometimes. The opportunity is created because the market is never accurate all the time and the constant change of opinion creates the trading opportunity. That's why I frame it as 'selling volatility'.

I'm probably fairly unique in terms of my jouney and being able to trade manually and algorithmically, but both and borne out of having bet & traded on hundreds of thousands of markets, analysed millions and actively deployed that knowledge into the market.

There are plenty of ways to do this, as many have discovered. There is no 'right' or 'wrong' way. Just one that works for each individual.

[ruthlessimon]

It's difficult to conceptulise things sometimes. The opportunity is created because the market is never accurate all the time and the constant change of opinion creates the trading opportunity. That's why I frame it as 'selling volatility'.

My own view is that opportunity (especially pre-off) comes from consistent structures hidden within the volatility - structures that traders and punters often misread. The problem (and my biggest frustration) is that these moments are rare, and the edge they offer isn’t huge - which probably explains why they exist in the first place.

[TupleVision]

It's difficult to conceptulise things sometimes. The opportunity is created because the market is never accurate all the time and the constant change of opinion creates the trading opportunity. That's why I frame it as 'selling volatility'.

I'm probably fairly unique in terms of my jouney and being able to trade manually and algorithmically, but both and borne out of having bet & traded on hundreds of thousands of markets, analysed millions and actively deployed that knowledge into the market.

There are plenty of ways to do this, as many have discovered. There is no 'right' or 'wrong' way. Just one that works for each individual.

Isn't "selling volatility" just mean reversion?

[jamesg46]

I used to buy into the idea of trading because it is heavily advertised by influencers. bla bla you can secure your profit by trading out bla bla.. and all that.

but i now have gone back to just doing straight bets.

The only thing that matters in this game is whether you think the prices offered are off its "true value". Everything else is just a gimmick.

If you think you can find good value, a straight bet is sufficient to be profitable long term. Trading out, ironically may work against you if you dont get good odds to exit.

And i really hate trading now, a fire and forget straight bet is so much more convenient and time saving. Early in the morning you scrap the web for fixtures, populate all the data, crunch your numbers and pull up your spread sheet, read the news and add a bit of qualitative analysis in there and place your bets and go off to do your own things for the rest of the day. Who can hate that?

In the past i have made rage bets when trading live in play. Entire season's good work destroyed just like that. Straight bets remove that risk altogether. In fact i dont even watch the games now.

I am not saying opportunities dont exists with trading, in fact i am inclined to believe there are even more opportunities to find good value in play, Its just that in order to do that you need to be able to tell what are the chances of :

Home team winning when they are 1 -0 down and there is only 45 minutes left to play.

vs just

Home team winning in 90 min.

Obviously the latter is easier to predict (but also more efficient ).

And as the game is ongoing, your predicted odds have to be updated in real time as well.

you need to have good knowledge in mathematics to be able to calculate that, i should probably focus on getting a phd in math first.

In play odds history are notoriously hard to find, without that i cant build a good model. Of course, the lack of information also means the in play market will be more inefficient, and present more opportunities, but like i said, i simply dont have the knowledge to capitalize on that right now.

I have started doing straight bets from last season and i am going to continue this season and its working for me.

I used to trade a lot, but it’s too time consuming & emotionally draining. There is reward for doing it, but by god it’s heavy on time vs reward.

I do from time to time come back and “try to trade” but I lose interest so quickly that I just end up doing silly things out of boredom.

I also now just straight bet, its easily automated which makes life so much more enjoyable.

When I first started out on my journey, I come across a comment that didn’t make all that much sense to me. “People need to think in probabilities” I remember thinking what the fuck does then even mean.

I now make a 40% roi on football betting, & that only came after I fully understood the above comment quoted.