[GigabyteCoin]

I used to use the betfair platform until it they blocked themselves from being viewed in Canada for some strange reason right after they were purchased by ladbrokes I believe it was.

Anyways, after playing with them for a few years, I was horrified to learn about their 60% tax on consistent winners that they have dubbed a "premium charge".

Found some sort of edge to exploit and reap profits?

Betfair doesn't even care to talk to you to ask you what you are doing, they will just charge you 60% of your winnings once you go over a certain limit. [0]

[0] https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2011/jun/29/betfair-premiu...

[phillc73]

Betfair merged with Paddy Power, not Ladbrokes.

They probably stopped offering their service in Canada due to unclear licensing and operating regulations for their Exchange product. It has happened in a number of other jurisdictions too. What you need is a good friend or relative in the UK or Ireland, and a VPN.

However there are now other exchange betting options, with at least some degree of liquidity - Betdaq, Smarkets and Matchbook for example.

Professional punters still have ways of getting on, which circumvent the online restrictions. Once all their accounts have been limited or closed with the online bookmakers, the next step is usually a string of agents across multiple locations, working on commission, and placing bets on the punter's behalf. It's still possible to get on for farely large amounts like this.

If horse racing is your game, Hong Kong is where the money is at. Huge totalliser pools (park-mutual) where the size of an individual's bet is unlikely to move the market very much. Now that there is co-mingling with a number of other pools around the world, one doesn't have to be in HK to bet there.

I've recently started having a proper go at the Daily Fantasy Sport option, now that Draft Kings has opened up in the UK and a few other European locations. Moneyball in Australia is also quite good, albeit much smaller prize pools. However, this weekend they just launched a DFS horse racing product which looks pretty interesting.

[eric_h]

Minor nitpick re: horse racing: it's "totalisator" (usually abbreviated as "tote") and refers to the machine that keeps track of the pools and odds, and the term for the betting pool type is "parimutuel".

Fun fact: totalisators were originally mechanical computers that were used to price betting pools around the turn of the 20th century (http://www.computerhistory.org/atchm/racetrack-betting-mecha...).

[GigabyteCoin]

>However there are now other exchange betting options, with at least some degree of liquidity - Betdaq, Smarkets and Matchbook for example.

That's good to know.

But do they impose the same sort of "60% winners tax" that betfair does? Or anything close to that?

Because if so, I wouldn't even bother signing up.

I don't need to gamble that badly!

[the_cat_kittles]

im actually curious how accurate the lines they show are, vs if you used their api. do you know? theres a lot of noise in them as far as i can tell- just wondering if its real or if they are jiggling the numbers around to make it look more appealing.

[seanalltogether]

I'm confused, since betfair is an exchange aren't they just taking a cut of the action? Why would they add a heavy tax onto profits which would just drive heavy bettors away?

[joosters]

They do it because they can, and for many gamblers, Betfair is the only place they can realistically keep betting at. Other bookies will restrict winning gamblers’ stakes or refuse their bets, and other betting exchanges have far less liquidity than Betfair. So, successful punters on Betfair just have to grin and bear it...

n.b. The 20-60% ‘premium charge’ that Betfair inflict on long-term winners is different to their standard 2%-5% commission that they charge everyone for any net profit on a market. The premium charge is calculated weekly over a customer’s profit & loss. So its effect is not the same as if the commission was as high as 60% per bet. Like a tax, the PC won’t make a profitable gambler unprofitable, it ‘just’ means Betfair get to keep more of your profits.

It’s also worth pointing out that the standard commission (2-5%) can add up to far more than 60% of your winnings anyway. As no-one wins every bet they place, the commission will become a larger percentage of your net profit. For example, Betfair charge me 2% commission and I ‘qualify’ for their premium charge of 40% - but my betting patterns already result in over 40% of my gross profit going to Betfair :(

[GigabyteCoin]

That's the scam.

They get you hooked thinking they are only taking 5% or whatever it was... and from pretty much everybody who bets there, they do only take 5%.

But all of the "smart money" gets taxed at 60% when they inevitably take all of the losers money who only paid 5%.

So in essence, they are doing exactly as you suggested... "they're just taking a cut of the action." But it's a 65% cut!