Betfair scalping for beginners

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Dallas
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On each of the lays you have the condition set to trigger higher than the odds your laying at, this is ok but need the price to bounce back down to be matched after its triggered otherwise if it just continues to drift it wont match.

Also you using the conditions "back price" is equal to 16 which means this will only trigger if the back price is exactly 16 anything higher or lower will be ignored so i would change that to greater.
Mattlindsay
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Joined: Fri Jul 10, 2015 1:51 pm

Thanks Dallas, I've updated both back trades to be taken at a greater price as you say the lay side I understand now, I prefer a fixed price as I know what my liability will be I suppose if I programme it to be greater than x price to be lay traded I would have more matched but have more exposure if it came back to win. What would you do?
I've also ticked restrict refresh from 2 secs before the off to 1000 secs after the start time do you think that will make a difference in having more trades matched?
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Dallas
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If your rule is only for IR and your running it on all or most of the days races restricting it the way you have will help if there is two in-play at the same time at least its not cycling through all the other markets not yet in-play unnecessarily

Placing the lay at fixed odds is what ensure you know what your max liability will be, the back condition you where using to trigger it wont effect that - but now it can trigger the lay when the back odds are greater than 16 rather than having to be exactly 16 as it was previously set to do which means it will fire much quicker and more often
Mattlindsay
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Hi Dallas

I hope you don't mind but I've enclosed the file would you mind having a look and see where I'm going wrong.... All i'd like is a lay bet to be put into the market in play after 3 secs at 19.5 then green up when triggered at 21 ticks higher. With a stop loss as well. My only issue is having the trades put into the market after 3 secs. Help!!!!
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Dallas
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Its triggering fine but because your lay it well below the trigger odds it needs to bounce back down to get matched, and as you have noticed when it does bounce back down it can then just as easy continue further down and trigger your stop loss straight after - and if it goes on to win by crashing through your stop loss you ll lose a hefty amount
millahjovich
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Joined: Thu Jul 21, 2016 11:04 am

How much did you start with in your account?

Have you managed to increase it at all?

I'm finding it very confusing at the moment.

I'm literally just struggling with the basics, i.e. whether to back or lay first, then whether to wait for the price to increase or decrease?!

How did u get to grips with it? Just watching videos etc??
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jimibt
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Location: Narnia

millahjovich wrote:How much did you start with in your account?

Have you managed to increase it at all?

I'm finding it very confusing at the moment.

I'm literally just struggling with the basics, i.e. whether to back or lay first, then whether to wait for the price to increase or decrease?!

How did u get to grips with it? Just watching videos etc??
yawn... trollific
magwitch78
Posts: 55
Joined: Wed Sep 30, 2015 8:26 pm

Does anyone know if you can set the fill or kill delay in global settings to more than 99999seconds? basically im trying to put an order in the market and only once it starts to match do i want to offset (in batches of 50) this will be over days potentially therefore need more than 99999 seconds. Or do i even need the fill or kill ticked to do what ive stated? thanks..
JPV787
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Joined: Wed Mar 30, 2016 11:27 am

Hi, im pretty new to this so forgive my potentially dumb ass question.

If I am trading with a very small bank, say £10 and if I am doing back to lay. Could I put the full £10 on the back side then when it gets matched, put a £10 order in on the lay side? Or must I have enough to cover the liability?

Thanks :)
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marksmeets302
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laying will decrease your exposure, so that's fine.
JPV787
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Great thank you for the reassurance, I didn't want to risk my pitiful bank roll. I just tried it on the last couple of races and so far so good :D
dannycutts
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Location: West Sussex

A very useful thread... best spent 2 hours this week so far :D
Bluesky
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Joined: Mon Sep 19, 2016 9:26 pm

mugsgame wrote:This is a post I put up somewhere a while back.
It may contain some stuff that may relevent.

I don't know if this is any use to anyone, but this is my style of trading pre race and a few pointers that I use.

Try to be more selective about which races to trade.I know of many who go from race to race like a loony. You can make a few quid race after race and on the last race lose the whole days earnings and some. Look at trading less races that have a good "shape". If you have the patience (which is the most important and most overlooked aspect of trading IMHO) you can watch 20 races and then trade 1 and win a days wages.
A suggestion for those struggling is maybe find a race where the market thinks it is a 2 horse race. I'll set up a fictitious race.
The prices are 2.02, 2.76, 40, 44, 50+ the rest (another 6 runners).
You will find 2 or 3 races a day like this. You can pretty much forget the rags, although you need to keep and eye out in case 1 moves in significantly. So concentrate at the 2 at the head of the market. There are 2 scenarios here.
1) 1 or more outsiders move in and not a lot happens at the head of the market except a small drift.
2) 1 of the favs moves in which means..............yes that's right! The other moves out. The trick is waiting until that happens then jumping on the gravy train to untold wealth.

Try to get a grasp of how a market works, that is fundamentally the most important thing you need to learn. An efficient market is at 100%, the way this is calculated is by dividing 100/the odds. So a runner trading at 2.0 would be 100/2 =50% of the book. (remember the book adds up to 100) that means the rest of the field will add up to 50%.
If 1 runner is 50% of the book and the other is 36% (100/2,76) that means that 86% of the book is concentrated on 2 runners. They dominate the market and another runner would have to move a huge amount to impact these 2 prices. Which leaves us to concentrate on 2. What you are looking for next is a sign that something is going to happen, like i said it always will. So what are the signs?

Look at the range of prices that the runner has been trading at, if you look at the ladder you will be able to see this. The critical points are the bottom and top (resistance points) When it gets there something will happen, if it "breaks through" then it will almost certainly go much further. If it doesn't then it will "bounce". It rarely just sits at the end of the trading range dormant. What usually influences this is the other horses. Remember what happens to 1 has to effect all the others, the one most likely to be effected is the next shortest price runner (2nd fav in this case)
A good trade would be if the fav has reached the bottom of it's range, which means punters are reluctant to take a lower price that this, and the 2nd fav if near the top end of it's trading range, which means punters are reluctant to LAY a bigger price. If the fav were to hit the bottom and "bounce" the 2nd fav would stream in, this will gather momentum, don't be greedy and don't use a stop loss. It is not unusual for the prices to jump around. It is the medium term trend (swing) you are trying to capture.

With practice, patience and enough matched you can make a living trading 1or 2 races a day.
This is simplistic and there are things that can go wrong. Watch the market and try to understand what the market is doing. See how the movement of 1 runner effects the others and in what proportion. This is KEY. Some use the excellent graphs BA has. For me all I use if the BF market graph within BA with a 10 second refresh, the ladder tab with both horses on, and TELETEXT live shows. Don't over think it, don't over complicate it. It really isn't rocket science, and that's the main issue for most I fear. Take a step back, use low stakes to practice. Trading horses at odds on a 10 tick wrong decision will cost you a fiver (to give it some perspective). Before you make every trade you need to set a point that you will exit, don't set this too tight. A 2 or 3 tick's is no good. But you need an escape route. Letting it go and hoping it will come back or even worse letting it go in play is trading suicide and amateur. Don't do it!

If you spend enough time watching the markets and understanding what's happening you will crack it eventually.

I have talked a fair bit about perspective, and here is something to think about. Good traders will earn more that a doctor does (which is frankly disgusts me), that doctor spent maybe 6 or 7 years learning his trade. It doesn't take that long to learn to trade, but you need to put the hours in for sure. The other thing is that doctor didn't get to operate on a patient after a few days did he? He learnt the procedure and maybe practiced it in the classroom lots and lots of times, until he became so good at it when he did finally have a patient on the operating table in front of him, he had the skill and confidence to do the business.
There are no half measures here. To a certain extent, if you can trade with £50 you can trade with £100 or £1000 (as long as the market is liquid enough) The level of skill is exactly the same, the reason you entered and exited the market should be the same. Once you can effectively trade on 2 runner markets like this and your confidence and experience grows, then more complex markets can be tackled.

The main problem with this is if you have a limited time to trade on your day off from work, sitting there all afternoon and not making any trades is tough, and the discipline that requires is rare to find. But what is better, sitting there and not losing half the wages you have worked so hard for or feeling a bit frustrated but living to fight another day. My priory is not to LOSE and PROTECT my bank at all costs. The rest comes I promise.

Summary:
1) Keep it simple
2) Be patient
3) Have realistic expectations
4) Be patient
5) Understand the market
6) Have a reason to enter the trade and a reason to exit it
7) Have an escape route planned, and stick to it
8) Be patient
and finally........ Be patient

Does this make sense to anyone?

Disclaimer:
I don't have all the answers, the way I trade suites me and my attitude to risk. It works for me but it may not work for you. Take out the bits that make sense and discard the rest. Eventually you will form you own style. There is no "holy grail" and there is no easy road to Betfair nirvana. I wish you all well.
This was posted over four years ago, but unless I have missed something important, I think the information given here is still excellent advice. Does anyone think markets have now changed meaning this strategy is now out of date?

I can't think of a reason why this should not be still a good area for new traders to operate in, but I am aware that markets change continually, and what worked at one time can stop working in the future.
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LeTiss
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Joined: Fri May 08, 2009 6:04 pm

Teletext live shows :lol:

That sounds like something from Jurassic Park now
kerberus
Posts: 366
Joined: Mon Aug 05, 2013 3:28 pm

But amazingly, that's not the end of the teletext story. A small band of geeks have managed to resurrect the old format, and have recently launched a brand new teletext service. Seriously - a new teletext service has launched in 2016.
LeTiss is still getting potty-training - have patience with the young whippersnapper. :D :lol:
Aaah the good old days. :(
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