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I have two distinct lives. One in the trenches of low-budget film and television, the other in professional gambling. Because of the feast-or-famine nature of show business I need a reliable income... gambling. So here you will read about both worlds. Enjoy!



Friday, October 5, 2012

Opportunities

Forget politics, this is money.  Elections are great times for advantage players because the lines are ridiculously screwed up. As of today, if you go to Intrade.com, Obama is trading at basically 7-3. That means if you bet Obama for $700, and he wins you win $300. Now if you go over to Pinnacle Sports and bet Romney you are getting 4-1. So say you bet $200 on Romney, and if he wins you win $800. But what if you make both bets? If Romney wins you lose -$700 at Intrade, but win $800 at Pinnacle. If Obama wins you lose $200 at Pinnacle, but win $300 at Intrade. You win $100 for every $900 bet! You can't find action like this very often.

Now this is a bit of a problem to have access to betting these places if you are in the US. Some people have been known to have friends in other countries to make these bets for them, and some have found other ways around this problem. I leave it to you to figure out how to get your money down, but these are the kinds of situations that advantage players look for, so keep your eyes open.

One of my favorite writers,  Damon Runyon said,

It may be that the race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong - but that's the way to bet. 


NOTE: I should have credited Mike Shakleford for fisrt mentioning this on Gambling With an Edge.

2 comments:

Nyne said...

I don't know much about betting sports or how to read the odds, but looking at Pinnacle, I see Republicans winning at 3.85 and Democrats winning at 1.308. That leads me to believe that these are "for one" payouts, not "to one", meaning your $200 bet on Romney would pay a net win of $570, not $770. Am I reading this wrong? Or has the line just moved that much since you posted?

If I'm reading this correctly, the current value is still about $70 per $1000 bet ($722 at Intrade on Obama at .48:1, $278 at Pinnacle on Romney at 2.85:1). But alas, it's not practical for me to get the money down. Maybe in 4 years...

Richard Munchkin said...

Several people have pointed out to me that when Pinnacle puts out a line of 4-1 that means 4 for 1 not 4 to 1. That means the bet is not as good as what i originally thought, but there is still a solid middle there. Since I posted this my millions of readers have pushed the line down from 4-1 to 3.85-1. Or maybe it was just smart gamblers who fiubd it without me.... Nah.