Smarkets public API

[Naffman]

Peter, have you ever thought about creating software for trading Asian bookmakers/exchanges. I know there are agents who offer APIs in the UK (or in fact you could see if it's possible to set yourself up as an agent and skip one layer of middlemen). I hear there is massive liquidity, they welcome winners, plus you get paid in rebates on turnover (think if you had a rebate on all the volume being pushed through BetAngel!). The only sticking point is perhaps it's a bit of a grey market. I'm sure most professionals or people aiming to become professionals would accept a bit of financial risk though. Trickier question might be whether you'd need a UK gambling license to operate as an agent passing through volume to Asia. Asian markets are something I'm going to investigate more once I have more time.

I've heard the ABE (Asian Betting Exchange) used through Citibet makes Betfair look seriously small in comparison. Don't know much about it but will update if can get in.

[megarain]

I thought this was run by the triads.

New accounts are only opened by referrals, of locals .. at least it was.

Maybe its changed. I used it 4 yrs ago .. there were some opportunities ..

[Emmson]

Don't have a Smarkets account and no plans to open one, read some off-putting stuff on message boards including this one. A much more exciting development is a soon to come judgement by US Supreme Court on gambling.

[Trading96]

You're the owner of a Betfair/Betdaq software whereas Smarkets intend to build their own API and rival these 2 exchanges. Hence why they don't need BA (and the other API developers) and would rather traders promote it who have no financial interest with other betting exchanges.

I think you are misunderstanding what an API is, it's created for developers to build on top of.

I remember a thread a few years ago about smarkets refusing to pay out after a market maker made a mistake or was that matchbooks?

It's them and years later they're still at it

By that I mean earlier this year I had one voided not sure if they've change policy since.

[vide0star]

Founder/CEO Jason of Smarkets here. It's been years since I posted in this board but I've kept an eye on it. With Euler's permission, I would be happy to answer questions (in a new thread?) to go over Smarkets, our plans, etc.

I would like to say, however, we have never banned winners nor will we ever. We've have many six figure winners. I'm happy to open up the conversation if it's ok with BetAngel.

[spreadbetting]

Looking on the forum there are posts going back as far as 2010 where we were talking about the smarkets API and it still appears to be an invite only option for their market makers, who I assume are more than happy to keep it a closed shop.

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2832&hilit=smarkets ... =10#p17563

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=4281&p=30750#p30855

[xitian]

Hi Jason,

Nice to see you on the forum again. It's really nice to see you engaging with potential customers.

A few questions I thought of:

1. Do Smarkets trade their own markets or have plans to? By that I mean have internal or external trading teams or automated systems (such as cross-matching) that have preferential trading terms (be it latency, commission structure, or anything else)?

2. Do Smarkets see their 2% commission structure as sustainable in the long term? In other words, is it currently being used as a tool for growing market share but likely to be raised later if Smarkets get bigger? Or is it a sustainable fee which allows Smarkets to profit sufficiently in the long term?

3. Do Smarkets ever plan to penalise winners with higher fees like Betfair's Premium Charge? Please would you expand on your answer giving your opinion on such charges.

4. Do Smarkets have internal policies preventing employees from viewing customer trading data/history unless where specifically required by the customer?

5. Are Smarkets investing in the technology of the exchange, and what are the next big releases/innovations to expect? Will the streaming API eventually be made available to everyone? (I see streaming as a competitive advantage, so it would effectively be a 'Yes' to question 1 if it's not made available publicly).

Thanks for your time!

[xitian]

Sorry I asked...!

[northbound]

Sorry I asked...!

I was thinking the same

[vide0star]

Thanks for your interest guys. I didn't receive permission to post from Euler. It's important I respect the board rules. You can always email me at smarkets and I'd be happy to answer your questions directly.

[Euler]

Jason, you are welcome to answer those questions put to you here. From a community perspective, we don't want the forum to be used as a place to advertise or promote services, especially if others are already being well funded to promote.

As you know, I have been in touch with smarkets, but my daughter is currently in hospital so not top of the list at the moment.

I have to drive our workload on our own timelines to have any chance of keeping on top of things, so new stuff will always be second to that. We get about a dozen queries a week about promoting other things, but we are really focused on helping existing paying customers first so that will always take priority.

[vide0star]

Thanks Euler. You've been a tireless champion of exchanges and I've been following BetAngel for a decade now. I totally understand your point of view and I'm sorry to hear about your daughter. I will stick to answering the above questions and not promote the company.

1. Do Smarkets trade their own markets or have plans to? By that I mean have internal or external trading teams or automated systems (such as cross-matching) that have preferential trading terms (be it latency, commission structure, or anything else)?

Yes, we do trade our own markets through a subsidiary called Hanson. Hanson pays commission the same as everybody else. We treat Hanson as arms length as possible. Adding liquidity to a challenger exchange is no small task and Hanson is solely designed to do just that.

It's important to note that Hanson trades on other exchanges as well as Smarkets has other institutional API partners that provide liquidity.

2. Do Smarkets see their 2% commission structure as sustainable in the long term? In other words, is it currently being used as a tool for growing market share but likely to be raised later if Smarkets get bigger? Or is it a sustainable fee which allows Smarkets to profit sufficiently in the long term?

Yes, and we hope to decrease it in the future. We're pretty open about our numbers and publish our annual report if you want more revenue information and we've been profitable for the last three years.

3. Do Smarkets ever plan to penalise winners with higher fees like Betfair's Premium Charge? Please would you expand on your answer giving your opinion on such charges.

I think the BF premium charge started off as not a horrible idea but was poorly executed. I understand why they did it, but I think we've seen the BF liquidity plateau since the implementation of the premium charge. I think it makes sense for some users to pay increased commissions, but in general, transaction fees historically in all exchanges trend towards zero, not the other way around. So while 'winners' should pay something more, in general fees should asymptotically approach zero.

4. Do Smarkets have internal policies preventing employees from viewing customer trading data/history unless where specifically required by the customer?

Yes

5. Are Smarkets investing in the technology of the exchange, and what are the next big releases/innovations to expect? Will the streaming API eventually be made available to everyone? (I see streaming as a competitive advantage, so it would effectively be a 'Yes' to question 1 if it's not made available publicly).

Everyday. It might be hard to see on the surface but we ship new code almost every day. We've done nothing but try to make our tech better and better. For the API, we're trying to prioritise market makers (they're aren't huge amounts of them) before we open it up further. We have a few on board now and are currently integrating the next batch.

[northbound]

Thanks for clarifying those points and thanks to Euler for allowing it.

A couple more questions, if I may ask...

For the API, we're trying to prioritise market makers (they're aren't huge amounts of them) before we open it up further.

Why?

Also, assuming that...

- your goal is to attract plenty of regular expert traders from Betfair in order to become the number one exchange

- these traders wouldn’t move to a platform with less liquidity

- they wouldn’t move to a platform that doesn’t offer an API and one-click software

... would you be prepared to open the API to everyone soon and also stomach a phase in which your market makers lose money to regular traders that just moved to your platform?

[Naffman]

Just had a browse of the horse racing markets and there's more liquidity on Smarkets than Betfair and the prices are the same

So if you're a gambler you should definitely be using them but trading is still a long way off yet.

Do you have any plans for a take SP and a minimum SP feature like BF do? I'd transfer all my SP stuff to you guys in an instant (2% versus 20+%). Betdaq unfortunately don't do minimum SP for those wondering why I don't go there.

[vide0star]

Thanks for clarifying those points and thanks to Euler for allowing it.

A couple more questions, if I may ask...

For the API, we're trying to prioritise market makers (they're aren't huge amounts of them) before we open it up further.

Why?

It's the easier way to build the ecosystem by having as many broad-based market makers as possible. Most traders (including BetAngel customers I assume) are liquidity takers. We need liquidity providers before liquidity takers. Now, it could be possible that BA traders leave bids/offers up but from the evidence I've seen, only institutional liquidity providers will add liquidity on a meaningful scale.

Keep in mind we're trying trying to open up the API asap. Yes, it will be normal for market makers to have to adjust as you add different types of bettors onto the platform.