Sports trading at the highest level

[BBMB]

Hypothetical scenario:

You're a professional sports bettor. One of the best in the profession. You can set your own lines for every sport in a timely and accurate manner.
You never finish in the red, betting at every available sportsbook.

I'm assuming you will eventually be limited and possibly even banned from many of the sportsbooks that you use and so you'd need to find another way to maximize earnings on your ability to trade.

What are the best ways to do this?

I know you can always sell your picks, but that seems a bit primitive in 2017.

I've seen articles on sports trading mutual funds. This seems like the most interesting option.

Can anyone offer further insight on the subject?

[Ralphie Halves]

You have runners. Best NBA sportsbettor in the world lives in Monaco, but gets his $$ down on every game with no issue between his runners and online books.

If you spread it out enough, you can still stay under the radar for the most part if you're smart.

[19th Hole]

Ralphie...Always look forward to your insight.

[Waterstpub87]

Running Mutual funds is a pain in the ass. The amount of compliance that you have to go through, because you sell them to the general public, makes it not worth it if you are a small fund, which you would be if you were a sports betting fund. Additional, I'm not sure, but I would bet that you would be only allowed to place bets in Las Vegas casinos, and not offshore books.

You would be better off starting a sports betting hedge fund. Pinnacle, Plus Bookmaker, Plus Asia books you can get down as much as action as you would like. With the hedge fund structure, you get a higher degree of fees, 2% of AUM plus 20% of profits, on top of that, structured offshore so you don't have to deal with US compliance laws.

Certainly doable if you could prove that you had an edge. It would be a hard sell at first, but people will invest in any shit that sounds exotic.

[BBMB]

I appreciate the responses

@Ralphie
Using runners does seem like the best way to maintain a solo sports betting operation. However, I've always seen it as a short-sighted solution. Wouldn't the runners eventually be limited/banned? It seems like a life-long career of replacing burned runners.

@Waterstpub
Hedge funds do seem like the more attractive option. The questions I have with hedge funds overall is about whether the market would be able to handle the large amounts of capital that would be needed to make it worth it. How many European books are consistently taking million dollar bets? I know there aren't too many if any in Nevada that are.
__
Is running your own sportsbook a realistic option if you have the software and starting capital necessary?

[RangeFinder]

Risk-Reward is not there to run a hedge fun. You have to trust too many people, which, in today's world, you cannot do. Eventually you will get burned. Badly.

[jjgold]

No sports tout hedge funds win sports gambling so get that out of your hea
People that win or not touts


Touts are scammers and or failed gamblers looking for easy money

[Sam Odom]

The questions I have with hedge funds overall is about whether the market would be able to handle the large amounts of capital that would be needed to make it worth it.

[jjgold]

This tread must be a joke

Gambling hedge funds now I heard it all

[Dirty Sanchez]

I'm sure this is a hypothetical scenario

[juicername]

Hook up with some euro and get on a betting exchange like betfair.

[juicername]

This tread must be a joke

Gambling hedge funds now I heard it all

I almost got sucked into one when I was younger. Was not gonna invest much but still glad I read up on it in the end. To this day no idea if they even did it or just collected money from suckers.

[Ralphie Halves]

I appreciate the responses

@Ralphie
Using runners does seem like the best way to maintain a solo sports betting operation. However, I've always seen it as a short-sighted solution. Wouldn't the runners eventually be limited/banned? It seems like a life-long career of replacing burned runners.

@Waterstpub
Hedge funds do seem like the more attractive option. The questions I have with hedge funds overall is about whether the market would be able to handle the large amounts of capital that would be needed to make it worth it. How many European books are consistently taking million dollar bets? I know there aren't too many if any in Nevada that are.
__
Is running your own sportsbook a realistic option if you have the software and starting capital necessary?

On runners: You probably go through a lot. Either getting burned, losing interest, becoming unreliable, etc. The people at the top are smart though, they're not dropping 50k on a game a week at one book with their runners. If you spread it out enough, and find a good stable of runners over time, I'd imagine that's how they do it. The guy I was referencing put a want ad out on twitter for a runner in Vegas when he moved away, so I know for sure he uses them.

On hedge funds: Not an option. The regulations and all that will sink you before the game even begins. Takes huge amounts of money to start before you even begin doing what you want to do with it. I've looked and I know a few guys. Trust me here.

On starting your own book: I want to do the same. Long-term goal though, since the software and licensing alone is in the low 6-figures. That's where the game is really won, but you have to be super capitalized, and be able to make a ton of mistakes early on. I don't have that kind of money right now. But it's a long-term goal for sure.

[jjgold]

most runners eventually steal your money

Vegas full of trash

[Waterstpub87]

On runners: You probably go through a lot. Either getting burned, losing interest, becoming unreliable, etc. The people at the top are smart though, they're not dropping 50k on a game a week at one book with their runners. If you spread it out enough, and find a good stable of runners over time, I'd imagine that's how they do it. The guy I was referencing put a want ad out on twitter for a runner in Vegas when he moved away, so I know for sure he uses them.

On hedge funds: Not an option. The regulations and all that will sink you before the game even begins. Takes huge amounts of money to start before you even begin doing what you want to do with it. I've looked and I know a few guys. Trust me here.

On starting your own book: I want to do the same. Long-term goal though, since the software and licensing alone is in the low 6-figures. That's where the game is really won, but you have to be super capitalized, and be able to make a ton of mistakes early on. I don't have that kind of money right now. But it's a long-term goal for sure.

What Regulations do you speak of? A quick look at HFR or EurekaHedge shows 1000's of funds with an AUM of less than 10M. If the regulatory burden was so terrible, they wouldn't exist. I know of dozens of hedge funds where it is a single trader running a small hedge fund, with very small amounts of outside capital. Depending on where, and how, you structure, it is not as bad as one might think. If you are not going after institutional money at first, then you do not need a large capital base to start. Added bonus, if its your money in hedge fund and you win, you are taxed at carried interest.

On risk return. Say that you are a small hedge fund, with 50M in AUM. You make 50 bets a day at 10,000 a piece, putting 500,000 into play. With all American sports plus tennis plus all soccer leagues plus all basketball leagues it would be hard, but not impossible to do this every day .If you average a 2% return on each bet, you make roughly 10,000 a day x 365 to make a profit of 3.65 million or 7.3%, which beats many hedge funds, especially because your vol will be lower.

If they are even money odds your stdev of bets will be 3.55 bets or roughly 35,500 or .71% daily, 9.55 annually standard deviation, so you would have roughly a .75 sharpe, which would be worse than fixed arb or vol arb funds, but which will out perform many macro and equity hedge funds. On top of that, sports bets are liquid, so you wouldn't have lockups and gates.

It wouldn't be easy. People would be skeptical. They would pull their money completely as soon as you had a losing streak. Its not impossible.

[biggie12]

This thread should be in the comics section. do we have one of those?

[jjgold]

Lol

It's s joke

All comedians

[MaddyMax]

You have runners. Best NBA sportsbettor in the world lives in Monaco, but gets his $$ down on every game with no issue between his runners and online books.

If you spread it out enough, you can still stay under the radar for the most part if you're smart.

Harabolos Voulgaris is not the best NBA bettor. He did take advantage of a bookies mistake playing 2nd half totals for years in early 2000's but that was simply books making mistake. Now the lines are set perfectly...he made a killing back then. But the 90's and early 2000's before gambling bill was passed and internet wasn't that big, many pro bettors succeed if they knew what they were doing. Things are lot tougher now and only a very few win consistently and its a grind.

Voulgaris name is often used in articles and promoted as a success gambler story by books to give hope to dreamers who will continue to gamble and lose....just like they did with billy walters (who took advantage of stale lines in the old days)...these guys if they bet on sports, they would lose their asss. Most of these guys took advantage of some errors back in the days and invested in other things and made a killing. gambling industry like to tout their stories to get more people to gamble.

[jjgold]

Mac you summed it up perfectly

Basically nobody wins

[MaddyMax]

Some of these responses are laughable. Runners are all days...prior to 2000's. Real pros nowadays use pinnacle, sbo, betcris/bookmaker and betfair. Vegas is a joke. Unless you are a known loser they won't let you big. If you win a few bets, they won't even let you put in 10k on an nba game without supervisor approval.....

On pinnacle you can put in what 10 runners can do with a click of a button. Then wait 1 minute and you can keep betting as much as you want but each time you bet the limit the odd will slightly drop. You can pound it until you feel the odd is not worth taking anymore. ONce the market is established and the game is blue circled, money rarely moves the line to one side because there will be people waiting to snipe arbs and the line will move back to what you were originally betting. only sudden injuries or something like that would move the line significantly once its blue circled in pinnacle.

[MaddyMax]

Mac you summed it up perfectly

Basically nobody wins

Actually i didn't say that. There are winners. Key to winning in discipline. Basically no body has long term discipline and that is why almost everybody loses long term.

there are clueless pickers who make bad picks, they are losers with or without discipline. But there is a good portion of gamblers who are decent at picking games but still lose their ass off because of lack of discipline.

[Ralphie Halves]

Harabolos Voulgaris is not the best NBA bettor. He did take advantage of a bookies mistake playing 2nd half totals for years in early 2000's but that was simply books making mistake. Now the lines are set perfectly...he made a killing back then. But the 90's and early 2000's before gambling bill was passed and internet wasn't that big, many pro bettors succeed if they knew what they were doing. Things are lot tougher now and only a very few win consistently and its a grind.

Voulgaris name is often used in articles and promoted as a success gambler story by books to give hope to dreamers who will continue to gamble and lose....just like they did with billy walters (who took advantage of stale lines in the old days)...these guys if they bet on sports, they would lose their asss. Most of these guys took advantage of some errors back in the days and invested in other things and made a killing. gambling industry like to tout their stories to get more people to gamble.

Still the #1 guy by far, you have to think. Who passed him up? Who else even beats the NBA on a consistent basis?

Lines have tightened for everybody in the past 15 yrs. Yet some people can still get it done. Hats off to those people.

[Ralphie Halves]

What Regulations do you speak of? A quick look at HFR or EurekaHedge shows 1000's of funds with an AUM of less than 10M. If the regulatory burden was so terrible, they wouldn't exist. I know of dozens of hedge funds where it is a single trader running a small hedge fund, with very small amounts of outside capital. Depending on where, and how, you structure, it is not as bad as one might think. If you are not going after institutional money at first, then you do not need a large capital base to start. Added bonus, if its your money in hedge fund and you win, you are taxed at carried interest.

On risk return. Say that you are a small hedge fund, with 50M in AUM. You make 50 bets a day at 10,000 a piece, putting 500,000 into play. With all American sports plus tennis plus all soccer leagues plus all basketball leagues it would be hard, but not impossible to do this every day .If you average a 2% return on each bet, you make roughly 10,000 a day x 365 to make a profit of 3.65 million or 7.3%, which beats many hedge funds, especially because your vol will be lower.

If they are even money odds your stdev of bets will be 3.55 bets or roughly 35,500 or .71% daily, 9.55 annually standard deviation, so you would have roughly a .75 sharpe, which would be worse than fixed arb or vol arb funds, but which will out perform many macro and equity hedge funds. On top of that, sports bets are liquid, so you wouldn't have lockups and gates.

It wouldn't be easy. People would be skeptical. They would pull their money completely as soon as you had a losing streak. Its not impossible.

You've looked at this a lot more deeply than I have, Waters. I read a book on starting your own hedge fund, and when I was done decided I was having no part of it. It's on my kindle, I can reference it for you later on if you want. I also had lunch with a guy from CA that had his own for three years then terminated it. Main kickers for me were the start-up costs and regulations. It was just way more than I wanted to deal with.

And like you were mentioning, a sports betting fund would be a really hard sell, and still really hard to do for a fund with little appeal for buyers.

Having your own book is the move here, fellas. Out of the three things mentioned, it's a real easy choice IMO.

[TheMoneyShot]

This thread should be in the comics section. do we have one of those?

[kidcudi92]

Hedge funds a pain in the ass

2/20 model but so much legal bullshit/money to start with involved

headache unless you have tons of money to start with/know the right people

sec watching you like a hawk (the smaller funds, the larger funds get away with whatever they want)

sec is pretty much a bunch of pussy fukks

[jjgold]

Does anyone realize most hedge funds go bust on wall street????

[Sam Odom]

is bobbyfk still in Vegas ?

is he still a runner ?

[Waterstpub87]

You've looked at this a lot more deeply than I have, Waters. I read a book on starting your own hedge fund, and when I was done decided I was having no part of it. It's on my kindle, I can reference it for you later on if you want. I also had lunch with a guy from CA that had his own for three years then terminated it. Main kickers for me were the start-up costs and regulations. It was just way more than I wanted to deal with.

And like you were mentioning, a sports betting fund would be a really hard sell, and still really hard to do for a fund with little appeal for buyers.

Having your own book is the move here, fellas. Out of the three things mentioned, it's a real easy choice IMO.

Work in the industry.

Lots of other bullshit hedge funds out there. I remember looking at a hedge fund that traded wine, it was down like 40% over 5 years. If they are able to get money for that, you could get money for sports betting.

[Ralphie Halves]

Work in the industry.

Lots of other bullshit hedge funds out there. I remember looking at a hedge fund that traded wine, it was down like 40% over 5 years. If they are able to get money for that, you could get money for sports betting.

Yeah, how many hedge funds closed last year? It was a lot, I'm just to lazy to look right now.

This is why I'm a die-hard Forex guy. You can do just as well in up markets as you can down. This bull market seemed to take a lot of hedge funds out of the game before they even got started.

[Waterstpub87]

Yeah, how many hedge funds closed last year? It was a lot, I'm just to lazy to look right now.

This is why I'm a die-hard Forex guy. You can do just as well in up markets as you can down. This bull market seemed to take a lot of hedge funds out of the game before they even got started.

It's a bunch, no doubt. Most hedge funds are pretty terrible investments. Lots of institutional money going from hedge funds to PE, RE and liquid alts. The 2 and 20 model is going to disappear, especially with smart indexes and beta.

[BBMB]

What Regulations do you speak of? A quick look at HFR or EurekaHedge shows 1000's of funds with an AUM of less than 10M. If the regulatory burden was so terrible, they wouldn't exist. I know of dozens of hedge funds where it is a single trader running a small hedge fund, with very small amounts of outside capital. Depending on where, and how, you structure, it is not as bad as one might think. If you are not going after institutional money at first, then you do not need a large capital base to start. Added bonus, if its your money in hedge fund and you win, you are taxed at carried interest.

On risk return. Say that you are a small hedge fund, with 50M in AUM. You make 50 bets a day at 10,000 a piece, putting 500,000 into play. With all American sports plus tennis plus all soccer leagues plus all basketball leagues it would be hard, but not impossible to do this every day .If you average a 2% return on each bet, you make roughly 10,000 a day x 365 to make a profit of 3.65 million or 7.3%, which beats many hedge funds, especially because your vol will be lower.

If they are even money odds your stdev of bets will be 3.55 bets or roughly 35,500 or .71% daily, 9.55 annually standard deviation, so you would have roughly a .75 sharpe, which would be worse than fixed arb or vol arb funds, but which will out perform many macro and equity hedge funds. On top of that, sports bets are liquid, so you wouldn't have lockups and gates.

It wouldn't be easy. People would be skeptical. They would pull their money completely as soon as you had a losing streak. Its not impossible.

I don't think there is any need to defend hedge funds as an investment. There are tons of them, like you said, some more successful than others. But there are many benefits to being a hedge fund manager, and the large ones aren't regulated by the SEC.

With that said, I question the ability to run a successful hedge fund in the sports betting market. I don't think any markets, including the Asian one's are liquid enough for large and consistent plays over time, yet. Definitely not at the same volume that other funds are able to enjoy in other markets.

It seems one would be better off finding books where they have a smaller chance of being limited, and attempting to stay afloat as long as possible, like MaddyMax suggested. Or open up your own offshore sportsbook if you have the resources necessary to do so, as Ralphie suggested. Perhaps it would also be wise to invest in the daily fantasy market to really try and maximize on your handicapping abilities.

In the meantime, being successful in the sports betting industry means you have the ability to identify value and take advantage of edges you have found in the market.

If the goal is to increase profits, Would one be better off applying such abilities to Forex, the most liquid market in the world? Does anyone have any insight to offer on the transition from sports betting to the foreign exchange?

---
Btw, I appreciate the private messages, but my post-count is too low for me to reply to them yet.

[Ralphie Halves]

If the goal is to increase profits, Would one be better off applying such abilities to Forex, the most liquid market in the world? Does anyone have any insight to offer on the transition from sports betting to the foreign exchange?

That's what I've done. Been a professional trading for a firm here in the States since 2015.

I was glad I was a sports bettor beforehand. Taught me a lot of the money management and patience I needed in Forex. If you don't have those two things, you're F'd 100x more in Forex than in betting. The good news is, it's a +EV market if you do it right. In a weird way, you can actually be the house instead of the player. I could go on, but I'm tired. Another time.

[jjgold]

98% of Forex traders lose

Perfectly priced markets

The smartest minds in the world cannot beat it

[triplecrown333]

wtf, forex is not perfectly priced, shit is rigged like anything else

[biggie12]

Hush my yute.... with the non sense