Archive for June, 2009

Could be another great trade but it’s not, its about your health.

Last year I suffered with my back. It was due to my posture, sitting down for very long periods of time. As a result I changed my lifestyle and also signed up to a posh gym with my own trainer. That has done wonders for my general well being and my back problems are a thing of the past.

Recently I started to notice was that my calf muscles are a bit ‘tight’. It appears that once again my posture is to blame. Because I used to do a lot of sport my legs muscles are very toned, just not that flexable. It seems that when I sit down now, my legs don’t carry enough weight and are too relaxed.

However the short term solution is quite simple. Stand more, but also put some support for your feet under the desk. This allows you to tense your lower leg muscles which will avoid calf problems. I have also made my PC headset wireless , which gives me the freedom to move around. On top of that I have a seperate area where I have set up a trading PC in a standing only position. So, as well as looking after your back, make sure you look after your legs as well!

I think all these problems show that I spend far too much time behind my desk. While the money is great I’m starting to think I need some broader changes in my life and a bit more balance. Rather than be a slave to the markets maybe I just need to stop pushing so hard and set off some new projects that don’t require me to sit behind the desk.

After all, never forget that good health is like money, difficult to get and easy to lose!

At throwing away a match. It looks like the England U21 players have learnt a thing or two from their elder brethren. I’ve been switching frantically between the Tennis, the football and racing all afternoon. The Tennis hasn’t thrown up many clear cut opportunities today but in between races I saw England were 3-0 and cruising it. I immediately thought, well they are surely in the final. So I put in a small lay at 1.01.

I think the only time I will ever feel comfortable with England is if they are 14-0 up with 30 seconds left! At least I was lucky on this occasion. Somebody was unlucky enough to lay the draw at 1000!!!

Just waiting for a player to get sent off, for it to go to penalties and for England to blast a few over the bar.

Just traded the 14:30 at Folkstone and the favourite was George Baker, ridden by, George Baker! George is a good jockey he just can’t get enough rides due to his height and therefore weight.

Curiously the race was won by another name, Huygens, no namesake jockey there though. The famous Huygens died in 1695. That would have been a first!

Huygens is reckoned to have written the first book on probability theory in 1657 but also is credited with discovering rings around Saturn. The NASA mission named Cassini-Huygens is one of the most successful and fascinating in recent times.

Full story here

Yesterday’s game in question featured Austria’s Jürgen Melzer, 28, who is ranked 30th in the world, and Wayne Odesnik, 23, a South African-born American ranked 109th. Melzer was the favourite and always should have been, but bookmakers reported “extraordinary” sums on him winning by three sets to love. He won 6-1, 6-4, 6-2.

The most astonishing figure is that £350,000 was traded on Melzer to win 3-0 on Betfair alone, at odds as short as 1-9. A comparable match between players with low profiles, on an outside court and not on TV would be expected to attract about £10,000 in set betting. Yesterday’s gamble suggests that a number of people had a strong belief in a Melzer win and by a 3-0 scoreline.

Before the game, £405,000 had been wagered on the overall outcome match (Melzer or Odesnik) on Betfair, with £395,000 of that on Melzer. On the specific scoreline, £242,000 was bet before the match, and £241,000 of that on 3-0 to Melzer.

While these big racing weeks bring lots of activity in the market you could be forgiven for thinking that everybody is just focused on the big races. I know some people prefer volatility while others hate it, some do well on the big races and others don’t. I tend to never pre-judge what is infront of me or set targets. I just try the best I can using all the tools available to me.

As a case in point, on Friday I started the day with a loss, no surprise there! After getting the first Ascot race under my belt I was then greeted by a massive steamer at Redcar. If I didn’t know how to swing trade I would have missed it. But jumping on the back of this opportunity, not only put the Ascot race in the shade a little, it got me off to a postive start and with spirits lifted, I trounched the day across the card.

So if you struggled to get anything from Ascot this week, don’t worry there is always opportunity in every market. You just need an open mind to find it.

See the following article: -

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/tennis/8085394.stm

This would open up the draw for Murray and create quite an interesting tournament. Nadal’s price has drifted already. The draw is out today and whether Nadal takes part or not is going to have a huge impact. Turn’s out Wimbledon is exciting, even before it’s started!

Evens shot turned over, has this happened before? OK, that headline doesn’t sound particularly exciting as this must happen very often, but not like this!

For some strange reason, every now and again, the market goes bonkers and this happened again last night. I got filled at 2′s on something that should have been 30′s way before the start of the race. At first I didn’t realise it had happened, but when my P&L started showing some odd amounts I figured something odd must have happened. A quick scan around the market showed that Halaak had been backed in from mid 30′s to just 1.84! Not just once but on several occasions. An obvious error and one that gave the backer pretty much no chance of getting a return. For anybody able to lay at the smaller prices, probably the best trade you will make for a while!

Looking at the £80m Real Madrid have paid for Ronaldo you have to ask, is it good value? Well according to the stats ,the answer on value is not clear but on “will it bring success?”, pretty emphatic.

I’ve studied loads of things about football markets including some less than obvious statistics. One of these is whether buying good players pays dividends. The answer was much more emphatic that I ever expected.  There is a very high correlation of wages paid to league position.It seems money does buy success!

If you look at the 07/08 premier league season the correlation was near 90%. This meant that the league pretty much ended up with the lower spending teams near the bottom and the higher spending teams at the top. This would have been much higher if the free spending Newcastle had performed to their expected level. The big four, not only ended up in the top four but also have the top four wage bills.  What happened to the three teams with the lowest wage bill? Relegation.

Sorry, but if your club owner doesn’t have big pockets it’s unlikely you will ever challenge those that do.

Was doing some research the other night for an investment fund I am on the board of. We were looking at consumer oriented companies and arguing about disposable income. I went off and dug around to see what I could find on the average wage in the UK and thought I would share this with you.

Before you click on the link, work out how much you earn and have a guess at where you are in the grand scheme of things. Then click on the link and find out for real! Very interesting.

http://www.ifs.org.uk/wheredoyoufitin/

It was nine years ago today that I placed my first wager on a betting exchanges. It wasn’t on Betfair funny enough, it was actually on Flutter. They were in business before Betfair but Betfair eventually ‘merged’ with flutter. Betfair arrived in time for the Oaks and turned over around £1700 if my memory serves me correctly.

My first wager was a £5 bet on whether the FTSE index was going to close up or down on the day. I won! That was followed soon after by a bet on Interest rates. My first sports bet came on the 11th June when I was betting on a couple of differnet players to win or not win the US Open golf. I managed to lay Colin Montgomerie at 7-1, while succesfully backing him at William Hill at 13-1. I also laid Tiger Woods at 2-1 while backing hime at 3-1 elsewhere. You won’t see that nowadays! My first month was pretty slow and the number of bets I placed never reached triple figures. I could see the potential back then, but I had no idea just how far things would go. I can quite easily top six figures now each month.

It’s been an interesting journey and there is still more to come. It’s been quite a journey. If you would have told me back then I would earn £300 whatever the result on the Oaks I would have said that was impossible. It just goes to show that you should use the word impossible with the greatest of care!

With the elections in the UK today I thought I would have a look at the political betting markets.

There doesn’t appear to be much going on to be honest, but I think the ‘leader change’ market could get very busy in the coming weeks. Worth keeping your eye on. I like reading the political betting blog which is always full of useful info. A few pounds to be made if you follow the pantomine that is UK politics at the moment. I look forward to registering my protest vote this evening after the racing has finished!

OK, I did these last two posts backward but I thought it was important to get the main points about June out before I reviewed May for you. Also, I took the kids to a theme park today so only had time early this morning to post a little.

May was a good month and went better than expected, in fact my third best ever month. I’m pleased because to beat last June is going to be tough so a good May gives me a buffer. I’ve been helped by some favourable results outside of racing. The F1 Monaco grand prix, the Tennis and Britains got talent has all added unexpected bonuses. On the downside I got the Champions League final wrong and had to close for a loss. I felt that Man U would definately score a goal. As it was, after that first Barcelona goal went in they just seemed to give up! Even in the last few minutes when there was little to lose there tactics just didn’t change. Very strange and the first time I have seen such prize so meekly surrendered.

From a trading perspective May started off with a very poor strike rate for me, but by the end of the month I had managed to string together quite a few runs in the 30′s which helped the month look much better. I still remain fairly unlucky over all. I seem to be good at picking up bad luck this year and great at avoiding good luck by not being behind my desk. The guys have started circling the calendar for when I am next out!