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I placed several bets on the Derby Trial today on Sportbet, which I normally use only for sports. I had the winning exacta and winning trifecta, but did not realize that they had ridiculously low maximum payoffs on those wagers -- only a max of 125-1 on trifecta. It's my own fault for not knowing the full rules until after I saw that my payout was $252 on a $2 wager instead of the $957 that the track paid, but I will never place a horse wager there again. It's a sucker's bet.
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In the marketplace today accepting horse wagers is merely a customer accomodation and in most places not enough volume is generated to make it a profitable proposition for the house.
It goes without saying that limits are in place to protect the profit margin of the house especially in low volume wagering operations.
Sportbet and Island Casino are first rate operations. -
Rudy, I can't think of any offshore books that pay more than 125 to 1 on exotic wagers. They are not part of the para mutual pool, therefore can't pay track odds without doing some heavy duty gambling.
If you want track odds on exotics, you must go to the track, OTB or a track that offers simlucasting.
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one notable exception: AcesGold
offers full track odds and payoffs.
still trying to hit a four-figure payoff
so I can test them!
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Hard to agree with that at all.Originally posted by bsky2:
They are not part of the para mutual pool, therefore can't pay track odds without doing some heavy duty gambling.
When you consider those offshores WON'T need to pay all those tax and overhead, its ridiculous that they can't AT LEAST offer you the track odds for payout.
If they are so afraid of somebody will hit a long shot (which doesn't make any sense at all), don't offer those exotic options. Otherwise, don't rip off the players.
Afraid of low volume betting and resulting on one-sided action? Then hire a better BM and create your own odds. Like DAS, they offer fixed odds betting and also track odds for you to choose.
Just because your BM is not good enough doesn't give you the right to ripoff the bettors.Comment
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Ayce,Originally posted by AYCE:
Hard to agree with that at all.
When you consider those offshores WON'T need to pay all those tax and overhead, its ridiculous that they can't AT LEAST offer you the track odds for payout.
If they are so afraid of somebody will hit a long shot (which doesn't make any sense at all), don't offer those exotic options. Otherwise, don't rip off the players.
Afraid of low volume betting and resulting on one-sided action? Then hire a better BM and create your own odds. Like DAS, they offer fixed odds betting and also track odds for you to choose.
Just because your BM is not good enough doesn't give you the right to ripoff the bettors.
You are misinformed about the cost of doing business offshore.
Start with the tremendous costs of marketing post-up players.
Now build yourself some infrastructure,desks,chairs,computers,faxes,
phones,servers,a communication room,etc.
Here in C.R.there is what's called the Caja to make sure that you pay the proper taxes on all your employees and oh yes by the way make sure you make bi-monthlty payments towards each employees mandatory annual bonuses.
Then through in a few employees from out of the country who in addition to paying them premium salaries you also have to provide them with housing,
Then there is my personal favorite the cost of internet bandwidth and 800 calls which in these off-shore countries is prohibitive.
Oh yes please throw in the cost of a license where applicable.
The BM has absolutely nothing to do with it because there is not enough business to warrant a fixed odds BM just for horses.
DAS has that expertise available to him because that's how he got his start in Australia where fixed odds wagering on horse racing is big business.
That same market to generate that kind of business to support the cost of a fixed-odds bookmaker for horses simply does not exist in the rest of the offshore world here in the Caribbean.
Australia and the U.K. absolutely.
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Well, the biggest para mutual pool of horse betting in the world is Hong Kong racing.
Let me give you an idea of their payout.
"According to the financial report by the auditing firm of Price Waterhouse, the HKJC returns 82 percent of the handle to bettors and gives 13 percent to the government, keeping only 4 percent for operating expenses and reinvestment and donating 1 percent to charities."
Normally, tax on W, P are little bit lower, while for exotic betting options like Q, T could be as higher as 17% to 21%.
I don't have the exact numbers on the tax situation in North American racing, but I don't believe it will be anything better than that.
Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) is going to be online next season to accept online betting, however, they will be only limited for local residents. There were also worries about the competition from several big international bookmakers.
Why? the reason is simple. They will propably able to retuen more than 82% of the handle back to their bettors with the different situation in tax and other expenses and therefore, having even better odds than the track payout.
Now, tell me which islands will need you to pay that % of tax on the horse betting that you will receive everyday?
Reality, you are correct. There are many, many costs involving when you will open a book, even in one of those tiny island. But the bottom line is, NONE of the books out there solely opened for horse betting. All those costs were already there even without the horse betting option.
Especially for a 7-11 book like Sportbet, they don't even need a BM to set the odds.
Take youbet.com for example, they are solely opened for horse racing betting, they have way more overhead than the offshores, they even need their customers to pay a monthly fee for their service (I remember this is the case last year, not sure about now), however, they still won't rip you off on payout. (Correct me if I'm wrong cause I believe they pay the real track odds).
Open a business in the begining is tough, like offering horse racing right now in most of the offshores (most of them with less than 1 year experience), you should not expect profit and it should be treated as some kind of long term investment. If you are not ready, simply just drop it.
Ortherwise, at least try to have a fair game for the players.
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Ayce,
I'm not absolutely sure but i believe youbet.com goes into the mutual pool.
I believe your point about what country has to pay 16 or 18% is misdirected.
The book dosen't have to pay it but it must still put a limit on horse wagering because there simply is not enough volume to overcome a bad run of luck.
Two things to consider:
a.when betting sports most of the time there is juice and the customer is laying a price,in horse racing unless the horse is odds-on the player is TAKING a price and in the case of exotics a small player can turn a toothpick into a forest.
b.there is inside information ,some time back i was involved in moving what is called THE STRING of hot horses from Md.
They did very well despite my skepticism.
When asked about booking horses i always advise against it for these reasons,and it is terrible to tie up phones with clerks that really aren't suited because of language problems to taking horses.
The thought of writing $2 horses and the subsequent claims you can count on just does not make this a winning proposition no matter how you look at it.Comment
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Points well taken.
You are absolutely correct, the limit is to protect the books from not having enough volume to overcome a bad run of luck.
Thats why I will call it unfair. because its something to protect the books only.
And you are correct, some of those exotic bettings can turn a toothpick into a forest. And indeed, there are some top class pro gamblers group are excellent in betting the horse (as far as I know, at least several in HK). However, I'm willing to bet you that 99% of the bettings that most offshores getting right now are what we called "public money".
Those are the same guys that will bet 5 bucks or 10 bucks on a 8 team or 10 team parlay with you everyday.
They are not the wiseguy.
Take a look at most of the offshores nowadays, the days of ripoff parlay odds are gone. More and more books out there has been using the "real" parlay odds, not those "standard vegas odds".
So, being afraid of turning a toothpick into a forest is not a very good excuse for not having a fair odds.
So why ripoff them?
Finally, I am actually down with you that most if not all the books should not go for the horse betting option at this time, especially by phone. You are absolutely correct, when it comes down to cost vs benefit, its just simply not worth it.
Its the same fact, we are probably seeing it differently because we are standing at different positions, namely,
players vs bookies.Comment
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Ayce,
You keep refering to Hong Kong racing and I'm going tell you about one of the best kept secrets regarding this hot bed of gambling.
There is a crew out of Australia headed up by a brilliant mathematician that is crushing Hong Kong racing for two reasons:
A.they have a superior program to crunch the racing form numbers and clocker figures
B.just as importantly, and i kid you not, the bettors of this region are extremely superstitious and the play certain program numbers in certain races on certain days of the week and certain days of the month.
c.this crew has run a program for as far back as they could get the data for this sample population and have this betting pattern down cold,what this accomplishes is if they get a lucky draw for post position and it is not the post position that the public is going to play because of their superstition,they get 4 or 5 to 1 on a horse that would be 8/5 on any other race or day of the week.
Believe me I didn't get this information from a fortune cookie.Comment
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Actually, there are more than one crew from Australia as far as I know and there are also some "guys" from UK and Southeast Asia.
Some of your info is true but some of them isn't, for some reasons, I just don't want to talk much more about them at here.
Anyway, back to the North American racing. I have a question. Is it so tough to put your betting into the para mutual pool? How to work out an agreement with those tracks at here? I remember Starnet had started to negotiate some kind of agreement several years ago with a list of tracks in North America but it has never been came real.
Does this has something to do with the "legal identity" of all those offshores? You know, US government has never say you guys are legal, so is this the major barrier for preventing such an agreement with the tracks?
[This message has been edited by AYCE (edited 04-30-2000).]Comment
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Reality, it is wrong-headed to say that it's OK to not pay correct odds on wagers just because the potential exposure is higher than on 50/50 wagers. For an operation the size of Island, their viability is not being jeopardized like a minor-league book's would be.
Bookmakers aggregate exposure to earn that 15-22% hold on horses, which is higher than ANY other action they take. To suggest that's inadequate is ridiculous.
The only way your argument holds water is if there's wiseguy action, which is easily managed with low limits or laying off action. Sportbet closes wagering on horses typically 20-30 min. before race time, which is ample time to offload exposure they don't wish to take and still make a profit. And I placed my wager over the internet, so the infrastructure/personnel costs are minimal.
In my trifecta wager I played a $2 3-horse box, which was a $12 bet, so my ROI maximum under the policy was not even 125-1, but less than 21-1. That's a sucker bet in anybody's book. When I'm playing a tri combo of 9-2, 11-1, and 18-1 odds horses, the book is going to win my money most of the time. And to not win very much even when I do hit one is not acceptable.
I stand by my point that a bettor should not play under those terms.Comment
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Ayce,
It is extremely difficult for reasons of licensing,background checks,due dilligence,bonding,and on and and on.
As i mentioned previously there just isn't enough interest in horse racing,just look at how many tracks are in financial trouble.
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Ayce,
I didn't mean that there is only one crew,what i meant was that my knowledge was of a particular crew.
To the best of my knowledge they are welcome at this venue because of the tremendous amount of handle they generate for this country to tax.Comment
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Ayce!
I'm a little lost in your post. Does Hong Kong racing have their own mutual pool and then take out a pct like a regular track?
Are their prices different from the tracks??
Do they put their wagers into the mutual pool???
If they have their own mutual pool they take their piece and can give the players full payouts. They are in a no lose situation.
Books in the states and offshore, book the horse after the 17-21% has already been glommed by the racing assoc. Thats why they limit payouts. HKR pays full because they can and still can't lose
THE DEVIL
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