- This topic has 33 replies, 19 voices, and was last updated 19 years ago by
.
- Posts
The S.P. doesn`t interest me in the least has i bet on the 100% book terms at Betfair or i`ve taken an early price if i could get on,however, i think your observation is “spot on“, it looks bad,even Stevie Wonder would see the tinkering that`s going on, certainly brings integrity issues to the fore!!
Cynical, legalised fraud is an apt description of the current SP situation.
I think it requires those who have a voice in the industry to put pressure on the Gambling Commission to look at the effect the Nov 2006 changes have had on returned SPs and how these changes have impacted on punters who bet predominantly at SP.
RH, I will follow your lead and try to complain through official channels and see where it goes. Probably tilting at windmills, but worth a try. Oh for a Robin Cook to put the case.
Shadow Leader,
Maybe the loss of terrestial TV might not be terminal, but it would certainly accelerate the decline in betting on horse racing.
Fortunately, the decline in betting on horse racing has come at a time when social attitudes to gambling are more liberated than they were. This has resulted in the relaxation of previously restrictive gambling laws which has led to a bonanza for High Street bookmakers. People no longer feel stigmatised about spending their cash having a wager, which is all for the good.
The payouts from any games of chance on licensed premises are regulated so that punters lose an acceptable amount of their stakes, yet the overheads for these games are relatively low in betting offices compared to those for providing betting facilities for racing. I believe this is why the major bookmaking firms have forced up the price of having a bet on the horses by manipulating SP returns.
I would have hoped that the relaxed gambling laws might have encouraged betting on racing, leading to increased interest among younger people. but I fear that forcing up the price of a bet will discourage the next generation of enthusiasts.
I know…… it’s a very complex issue….. the economics of racing and business empires reliant on betting, but if you raise prices, you kill off demand unless there is no substitute for your product. The demand for horse racing as a betting medium is still strong, but is in serious decline. Why push it down a slope?
Artemis – I can’t understand where you are getting the idea that "demand for horse racing as a betting medium is still strong, but is in serious decline"? Either it’s strong or it is in serious decline, surely? :biggrin:
That aside, I can’t see that demand for horseracing as a betting medium is in serious decline ~ it’s not. There are more and more opportunities to punt on, true, but that is not taking away serious amounts of revenue from betting on racing. Horseracing still is the product that is producing the majority of turnover for most firms, yes, even over football.
(Edited by Shadow Leader at 11:50 am on May 19, 2007)
Agree with Shadow Leader 100%.
I’m still firmly convinced that no-one goes into a betting shop to play FOBT’s, or wager at Portman Park, as much as the bookmakers wish that were so.
People go into the pub for a drink and put a quid in the fruit machine as an add on. They don’t go to play a fruit machine in a pub and have a drink to pass the time in between reel spins.
Similarly, people go into a bookies for a bet on a horse and put a quid in an FOBT during the gaps.
Unless the big bookmakers accept that racing is THE golden goose – and no matter how much malignant economic pressure they apply to engineer the opposite situation – they’ll eventually become like those Barry Noble outlets in Northern high streets, with lunchtime bingo, cash chequing facilities, banks of slots, and old ladies in bad aprons serving free cups of tea.
And they don’t want that, now, do they?
Sorry, SL. I should have said" relatively strong".
My perception is that the decline is a slow but serious one. I don’t claim to have any figures to support it, just my observations of numbers of people betting on horses compared to twenty or thirty years ago. There has been a significant reduction in betting offices, a lot of which are due to rationalisation, but rising costs and turnover failing to keep pace with inflation have had their effect. I’ve seen plenty of anecdotal evidence of a slow, steady, decline.
Maxilon,
I agree that most people generally do not enter a betting office to bet on FOBTs and I’ve already stated in an earlier post that racing is the golden goose.
I think the Barry Noble analogy is quite appropriate, but the big bookmakers would take it if it was more profitable than horse racing. Maybe that’s what you meant(tongue in cheek) by your last remark.
I can see where you’re coming from Artemis; it may appear that way but it really isn’t. Your average betting shop business accounts for such a tiny percentage of revenue in the industry that tbh what may appear to be the way things are going by looking at a shop isn’t the way things are happening at all. The majority of turnover occurs in call centres, then on the net to an extent – I’ve witnessed business on both [as well as in shops and oncourse]and demand for/business on, punting on racing hasn’t dropped from what I’ve seen, if anything it has actually increased.
I’m still firmly convinced that no-one goes into a betting shop to play FOBT’s, or wager at Portman Park, as much as the bookmakers wish that were so.<br>
Have to disagree with you here. There are plenty who go into the shops just to play the FOBTS. My town has a Ladbrokes and Betfred. The manager of the Betfred shop meets his missus in the Ladbrokes shop at lunchtime to play bingo and roulette, the waiters in the local Chinese and Indian restaurants pop in to knock their wages out, the manager of the local pub bets on anything during his breaks – even Portman Park. The last time I was in Newbury I popped into Corals at 10am (to get knocked back on the Pricewise selection) – all three FOBTs were occupied. That’s why the they’re opening at 8.30am these days- get the mugs in on their way to work.
I appreciate that betting office turnover on horse racing is only a part of the whole. It would be interesting to see the break down between betting offices, call centres, internet and exchanges.
Without figures, it is difficult to make a case that betting on racing is declining in real terms, so I will have to do some research to verify it. I’ll come back to it when I’ve got some evidence.
- Total Posts 17716
Perhaps I’m getting paranoid, but it’s just occured to me that there is now a firm link between early prices and off-course bookies controlling sp’s?:o <br>For quite a while now, early prices have been much tighter than used to be the case, a phenomenon I believed to be brought about by the exchanges. Now, I’m not so sure?<br>Let me put it like this: If you’re a major bookmaker, why offer a fair price on a horse when you know you can skin the punters at both ends? If he doesn’t accept your niggardly early price then you know full well you can shorten the returned sp, even by using the punters own money?<br>Please, don’t tell me it can be backed on the exchanges either, as the variance, at the end of the market that matters, is negligible until 10 mins before the off, and often dictated by tthe bookies’ own pricing.<br>I looked at Rio Riva in the 3.40 at Ripon this morning, thinking that the RP forecast of 13/8 was at the very bottom end of what you’d expect in a reasonable market, yet not one bookie is above 11/8, ( Betfair – 2.34.)<br>Just one race, I know, but preceded by thousands of others recently where the bookmakers appear to have their cake, and eat it.<br>Surely things can’t carry on like this, though, unless the off-course industry is denied its present abuse of the system, it’s difficult to see where it will change?:o
(Edited by reet hard at 11:24 am on May 20, 2007)
- Total Posts 17716
Quote: from thedarkknight on 4:23 pm on May 20, 2007[br]So – the bookies are deliberately putting in a horse really short in the morning, but no-one on Betfair is willing to lay bigger? How does that one work please?<br>Have bookmakers suddenly acquired the power to brainwash all punters into not taking any value on Betfair? (cue Alan Ridley :cool: )
Another amateurish conspiracy theory I would say RH – don’t give up the day job….
<br>(Edited by thedarkknight at 4:24 pm on May 20, 2007)<br>
Simple arithmetic TDK.<br>Why would anyone need to lay a favourite at substantially above the price available elsewhere?<br>Except, of course, in the last 10 minutes, when the ‘cosy club’ are in full swing, to engineer their own unrepresentative sp’s.
Quote: from Mounty on 8:45 pm on May 19, 2007[br]
The last time I was in Newbury I popped into Corals at 10am (to get knocked back on the Pricewise selection) –
Getting your money on. Why on earth would any good businessman turn down business? The inside information answer is obvious. Turn away or take a lower punt where the win information has been – deduced? – leaked. How often does this actually happen?
This is only the tip-of-the-corruption-iceberg. One does not need to be a TRF “expertâ€ÂÂ
Bottom line is exchange punters get better value than those betting with high street chains. Argue that point tdk?
- Total Posts 17716
TDK
You know as well as I do that the Betfair market consolidates around the shorter price horses as soon as bookmakers early prices are published, and there is little difference from then on.
Barry Dennis
When did lack of expertise ever stop you giving your ‘Bismarcks’?
Quote: from Mounty on 8:45 pm on May 19, 2007[br]The last time I was in Newbury I popped into Corals at 10am (to get knocked back on the Pricewise selection). <br>
<br>:o stuff by Corals
Can’t wait for Mr Clare to come on tv stating
" we’ve laid horse A for X amount to some shrewd punters, but we don’t take Pricewise bets "
<br>
(Edited by empty wallet at 10:06 pm on May 20, 2007)
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.