I had assumed that the situation where there is an overround available would almost never exist. Not sure whether I'm using the expression correctly but I mean the situation where it is possible to back or lay all outcomes on a market at an exchange at the same time to guarantee a profit. To my surprise a small computer programme that I have written is showing that it's not all that rare and occurs maybe 1% of the time on horses.
Can I use the betfair API or BetAngel to make money out of this? Intuitively I feel that there must be too much competition out there for this to be viable, and that betfair would already have snaffled any profits available like this, but, as I say, I've been surprised to see that overrounds do arise reasonably often (on horse racing at least).
Thanks.
Overround
Due to the cross matching the overround is a now non existent.
However, it does pop up from time to time. This is when it is very likely there is about to be a horse withdrawn. If this is the case the reduction factor will almost certainly be against you - hence the over round occurring. Tread very very carefully.
The 1 % you are showing is almost certainly this
However, it does pop up from time to time. This is when it is very likely there is about to be a horse withdrawn. If this is the case the reduction factor will almost certainly be against you - hence the over round occurring. Tread very very carefully.
The 1 % you are showing is almost certainly this
This was the first ever system that I looked at. Before my time on BetFair, I was tracking the odds across a dozen bookies. Whilst I never saw over round odds on a single bookie, it did occur if you had the ability to cover the entire field across multiple bookies. But even then, it rarely happened.Arbubu wrote:I had assumed that the situation where there is an overround available would almost never exist.
You can improve your chances with this by cutting out a few of the rank outsiders, but it might still only happen about as often as a premium bond win.
For me, I chalked this up as one of those "Theoretically possibly, but sadly not practical, systems".
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JollyGreen
- Posts: 2047
- Joined: Sat Mar 21, 2009 10:06 am
There must be some misinterpretation here on the word over-round. Basically there is always an over-round, it is normal market behaviour. I would assume you are referring to when the book percentage drops below 100%?
Reading what MG said about a likely withdrawal would certainly suggest this is your point of reference. This is called over-broke or at least it was in days prior to Betfair. I can't see why it would be any different now but some do refer to it as under-round.
As MG said, Betfair's XM policy has all but killed this. You still get the odd scenario and it usually involves a short priced favourite drifting badly as it is misbehaving. The book percentage can drop very quickly as the price of the horse gets larger.
Warning Will Robinson... This can be fraught with danger so pursue it if you want but please understand the risk. If a favourite is priced at 1.5 and is starting to play up as they present it to the stalls, its price will drift. If the book hits <100% you can back everything and can win money. You will notice I stated 'can win money'. The danger comes from that horse not running. You are betting at 99% as an example which is fine BUT, if that horse is withdrawn, a new book will form and the old book will be reconciled to account for the loss of the withdrawn horse. This will mean that although you were betting at 99%, when the book is reconciled you will have been backing at >100% and so will face a loss after the reconciliation of the market. This will mean a loss and in some cases a bloody painful one!
If I see a horse misbehaving then I look to play that drift only. This offers a backup plan. If I catch the drift and generate a decent profit the worst that can happen is a withdrawal which means I finish even, no profit but no loss. If the horse runs then I will make a profit from the drift with no additional risk.
HTH
Reading what MG said about a likely withdrawal would certainly suggest this is your point of reference. This is called over-broke or at least it was in days prior to Betfair. I can't see why it would be any different now but some do refer to it as under-round.
As MG said, Betfair's XM policy has all but killed this. You still get the odd scenario and it usually involves a short priced favourite drifting badly as it is misbehaving. The book percentage can drop very quickly as the price of the horse gets larger.
Warning Will Robinson... This can be fraught with danger so pursue it if you want but please understand the risk. If a favourite is priced at 1.5 and is starting to play up as they present it to the stalls, its price will drift. If the book hits <100% you can back everything and can win money. You will notice I stated 'can win money'. The danger comes from that horse not running. You are betting at 99% as an example which is fine BUT, if that horse is withdrawn, a new book will form and the old book will be reconciled to account for the loss of the withdrawn horse. This will mean that although you were betting at 99%, when the book is reconciled you will have been backing at >100% and so will face a loss after the reconciliation of the market. This will mean a loss and in some cases a bloody painful one!
If I see a horse misbehaving then I look to play that drift only. This offers a backup plan. If I catch the drift and generate a decent profit the worst that can happen is a withdrawal which means I finish even, no profit but no loss. If the horse runs then I will make a profit from the drift with no additional risk.
HTH
Most times you don't get much warning - Such as The first race at Wolves yesterday - Fantasy something? - It was heavily backed - The RF - to WD price was something like 20%. So you made your book at a 20% loss. It was behaving well (hard to tell in between all the waffle and adverts about Warner hotels/PPI and bunions) - went into the stalls and went beserk. WD immediately - Race off. So you're losing £200 for ever £1k you turned over. If you had some clever automation on this you're pants would be around your ankles.JollyGreen wrote:There must be some misinterpretation here on the word over-round. Basically there is always an over-round, it is normal market behaviour. I would assume you are referring to when the book percentage drops below 100%?
Reading what MG said about a likely withdrawal would certainly suggest this is your point of reference. This is called over-broke or at least it was in days prior to Betfair. I can't see why it would be any different now but some do refer to it as under-round.
As MG said, Betfair's XM policy has all but killed this. You still get the odd scenario and it usually involves a short priced favourite drifting badly as it is misbehaving. The book percentage can drop very quickly as the price of the horse gets larger.
Warning Will Robinson... This can be fraught with danger so pursue it if you want but please understand the risk. If a favourite is priced at 1.5 and is starting to play up as they present it to the stalls, its price will drift. If the book hits <100% you can back everything and can win money. You will notice I stated 'can win money'. The danger comes from that horse not running. You are betting at 99% as an example which is fine BUT, if that horse is withdrawn, a new book will form and the old book will be reconciled to account for the loss of the withdrawn horse. This will mean that although you were betting at 99%, when the book is reconciled you will have been backing at >100% and so will face a loss after the reconciliation of the market. This will mean a loss and in some cases a bloody painful one!
If I see a horse misbehaving then I look to play that drift only. This offers a backup plan. If I catch the drift and generate a decent profit the worst that can happen is a withdrawal which means I finish even, no profit but no loss. If the horse runs then I will make a profit from the drift with no additional risk.
HTH
Over-broke books do seem to occur from time to time but as others have said you need to be aware this may be due to the threat of a withdrawn horse. I would thus be very wary about fully automating this strategy.
You can still make a bit of money from this strategy as genuine opportunities do occur from time to time. I don't fully understand the maths behind it but small fields seem to be the ones that offer this opportunity most often. Occasionally the BF cross matching bot seems to be turned off for whatever reason, (I think this happened yesterday), and therefore you can get stuck into a few races in a row.
I wouldn't however look at this as a system worth pursuing in terms of making any real money. The only reason I ever bother with it is that I'm already trading the market and see it as a little extra profit on the side.
Incidentally trading over-broke books was the first system I ever used on BF and I think it is a shame BF had to spoil it. This isn't so much from a personal point of view as I've moved on to far more profitable things since then, but it was an easy entry level strategy and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be where I am today without it.
I suspect if I hadn't been able to make money early on using this method I would have got bored of BF and moved on with my life. Chances are I'm not alone in this attitude and it really is a shame BF have gone along the route they have as many newbies must be put off by how hard it is nowadays to turn even a small profit.I certainly wouldn't be putting the money through the markets that I now do if BF hadn't "allowed" me to skim a bit of profit off the top in the early days. Another example of BF short sited thinking in trying to squeeze everything they can from their customers!
You can still make a bit of money from this strategy as genuine opportunities do occur from time to time. I don't fully understand the maths behind it but small fields seem to be the ones that offer this opportunity most often. Occasionally the BF cross matching bot seems to be turned off for whatever reason, (I think this happened yesterday), and therefore you can get stuck into a few races in a row.
I wouldn't however look at this as a system worth pursuing in terms of making any real money. The only reason I ever bother with it is that I'm already trading the market and see it as a little extra profit on the side.
Incidentally trading over-broke books was the first system I ever used on BF and I think it is a shame BF had to spoil it. This isn't so much from a personal point of view as I've moved on to far more profitable things since then, but it was an easy entry level strategy and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be where I am today without it.
I suspect if I hadn't been able to make money early on using this method I would have got bored of BF and moved on with my life. Chances are I'm not alone in this attitude and it really is a shame BF have gone along the route they have as many newbies must be put off by how hard it is nowadays to turn even a small profit.I certainly wouldn't be putting the money through the markets that I now do if BF hadn't "allowed" me to skim a bit of profit off the top in the early days. Another example of BF short sited thinking in trying to squeeze everything they can from their customers!
We had a forum member on here many years ago (nerotulip) and I have a vague recollection that he said that in the very early days it was quite possible to make 5 fig months by using a similar strategy (obviously didn't last, or I would be typing this from my Yacht!)aperson wrote:
Incidentally trading over-broke books was the first system I ever used on BF and I think it is a shame BF had to spoil it. This isn't so much from a personal point of view as I've moved on to far more profitable things since then, but it was an easy entry level strategy and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be where I am today without it.
That would be nice! Unfortunately I was maybe making 30 or 40quid a day doing this. But considering I was a student at the time I was pretty happy with that. Still worked out at 10 quid an hour or so and meant I didn't have to get a summer job, and quite frankly when I first started out I didn't really consider it work particularly. Looking back now I have a few ideas about how I could have made much more from similar systems but it's a bit late now.
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JollyGreen
- Posts: 2047
- Joined: Sat Mar 21, 2009 10:06 am
Spot on and that is why I would look to trade the drift only or possibly the contraction of another horse which is ultimately balancing the book. Once you start trading the whole book you are trawling in deep waters and things can and will go wrong!mugsgame wrote:
Most times you don't get much warning - Such as The first race at Wolves yesterday - Fantasy something? - It was heavily backed - The RF - to WD price was something like 20%. So you made your book at a 20% loss. It was behaving well (hard to tell in between all the waffle and adverts about Warner hotels/PPI and bunions) - went into the stalls and went beserk. WD immediately - Race off. So you're losing £200 for ever £1k you turned over. If you had some clever automation on this you're pants would be around your ankles.