Arbing

arbing will definitely get you gubbed quicker. bookies can see what prices they have and what the exchanges have so its pretty obvious what you are doing. I think its a bit harder to spot e/w arbs, but if you can do it, so can they.
If you think about it, an exchange probably has a more “true” price of a horse than a bookie, so if the odds are close the bookie is offering a more realistic price and will be on the bookies radar.
I think to really get your moneys worth as it were is to hit them hard and fast a la @markcorrigan ( see the thread “secrets of the pharaohs”) or just use the accounts you are already bonus banned from to squeeze out that final bit of profit until they limit you into non-existence.

Yes Pickle I am with you on that one. The volume steadily builds as you get closer to the off and around 20-30 mins is a good time when it becomes the next race on that card. Also usually around 7 mins before a race all bookies prices go into one where they all offer the same odds. I don’t know the saying but I just call it the industry price. You have to be so quick but if you are there are small windows of opportunity to beat them but its often 2-3 seconds.

It’s at this stage where the bookies make the most of their money as people who haven’t taken prices slump towards the SP and people backing horses are never getting a fair price for their bet with the over round unless they happen to be on the correct horse in that 2-3 second opportunity.

P.S. I wouldn’t advise people to do the above as it’s a very quick game and I only feel confident because of having a phone and 2 screens on a computer to do it all.

£200 stake at 5/4.7 gives £45? Am I missing something? Care to explain?

I personally have never done horse arbs, actually, once. Bet365 increased price from 3.5 to 4 and exchange had lay price of 3.5. I put up £100 for roughly £10-12 profit. But that was only because I was already betting on the race so I saw the change.

I never really got my head around e/w arbing but from what I read it seems quite profitable. However I’ve never really understood the need to use bookies in the first place.

Correct me if I am wrong, but majority of the time your back bet and lay bet on a winner will be a loss. So say you back a horse for £200 ew and the back is 5 and the lay is 5.2. Normally you are loosing around £5. Say its 1/4, so you have odds of 2 on place and the lay is say 2.2. At this point you are not laying the place bet and waiting till 5-10 mins of when the bookies slash the price?

If so, once they slash the price, the price will also slash on the exchange…so Why not just do the same thing on exchange?

At £100 on exchange at 5-5.2 you are loosing £6.5. Back a place at 2 for £100 and wait till the odds get slashed. If they go even below 1.8, you are already making +£3 in aggregate. I think someone did say in the threat that it is simply trading. So why not trade one the exchange and preserve your bookies. If the worry is liquidity, the I understand, however Saturday liquidity on Smarkets is beautiful on all Channel 4.

I personally did arbs on footy only and that’s a story of how I messed up around 15 accounts in a span of two months. I also made only £500, so if you ask me if it was worth it, ‘absolutely ******* not’. (Jordan Belfort voice).

I was actually novice so that’s why only £500. If I were better at it I would have gone mad and made much more. But as a newbie I was going safe for 3-7% arbs. My stake was always £100 on aggregate so say £80 on bwin and £20 on bet365, or £34 on SJ and £66 on Ladbrokes and so on. So with £100 I would have £103-110 at the end of the match. My last week (before I went into MB) I made £140. My first week I made £20. My first week MB I made £290, last week I made £170.

Of course, because I rely on the few big bookies, my days are pretty much numbered.

Jay.

I haven’t done much e/w arbing but I think there are two reasons why you can’t just do what you said and ignore the bookie.

1. The place market can be slow to come to life so you probably won’t get value early (eg 2.0 in your example) on the exchange and wait for it to drop.

2. The place price on the exchange is based on the true probability of the horse placing so you probably won’t get value (eg a 2.0 in your example) on the exchange at all.

The place price on the bookie is based on 1/4 or 1/5 of the win price so this sometimes gives an untrue price.

So if you imagine an 8 horse race with every horse 7/1 and 1/4 odds to place 1-2. So odds 2.75 for any horse to finish in top two. But since all 8 horses are identical then the true prob on top 2 is 0.25 in probability or 3/1 in odds. So in this example the 1/4 terms is very bad value.

Now imagine a race with 2 horses evens and the other 6 are 100/1+ (no hopers). Same place terms means odds of 1.25 for either of the favs to place. But in reality its close to 100% probability, or say at least 1/10 in odds or 1.1 in decimal. So in this example the 1/4 terms is very good value.

1/4, or 1/5 are really just quite arbitrary numbers and sometimes are a good approximation to the place odds. In races with shorts favourites and/or a large number of really long shots you can find that 1/4 or 1/5 can be a very bad approximation for the place odds that works in your favour. Of course the bookies know all this so its not all that straight forward. They will generally offer really bad value on the win price if it is going to cause a big e/w arb, but sometimes I guess they need to be ultra competitive on the win price as lots of ppl would just bet on the win and opportunities arise where they leave themselves exposed to an e/w arb.

Also we use bookies for e/w arb because majority offer BOG so if your selection drifts on the win and they lay, you’ll get better odds to minimise losses.