Thursday 30 August 2007

Data

If you want to test some theories about how the prices move due to volume changes or whatever your pet theories are, then you need some historical data to work with. Some places charge for access to their data but Betfair make it available for free, although you need to have at least 100 Betfair points, but that shouldn't be a problem to you guys. If you want to get hold of some, then go to: http://data.betfair.com/

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Richard, slightly off the topic posted today but can I just ask how your bank is doing these days? how long have you been trading now?

I've been trading full time on the horses everday for the last 4 months and I'm coming to terms with the fact i'm not going to cut it. I used a bank of £500 and i'm down to £127 after 4 months. I don't want to discourage you or anything just letting you know.

Great blog by the way.

Richard said...

Hi,
Thanks for the comment.

I officially started tracking my bank at the end of June, before that I was making the odd bet, learning about trading, making mistakes and generally trying things out. When I got back from my honeymoon I reloaded my bank to £100 and started out again. The first software I used was Bet IE. I was also making the classic mistake of chasing my losses, so one day I'd be making a nice profit and then blow it and more when a trade turned bad and I didn't get out, but stayed in hoping it'd turn around. If you've read my free report (link at the bottom of the blog on the right), you'll see that I did some research into this behaviour (and have done lots more since) and have now stopped doing that. As soon as I stopped doing that I started to make little profits, bearing in mind I was using a max of £30 stakes, due to my bank size. I have been trading part time, around the demands of the missus and kids. I was down to around £60 (due mainly to loss chasing). I stopped chasing losses and also got hold of some new software (Bet Trader Pro) and that made a big difference. Seeing the price changes so much quicker and with the ladder interface, which lets you see the relationships between prices easier (Bet IE has a kind of ladder but it moves with the price and can lead to you making incorrect bets if the price has move before it has updated and you are clicking to bet) helped loads. I havnt been able to trade on the horses for a few days, due to last races happening before I can get to my desk, but my bank then was just shy of £200, so effectively I have doubled my starting bank. Okay, so not a fortune yet, but on the right track. I've now been forced to try to work with football and am not looking so good, due to some stupid initial mistakes. So my official bank is down to the £150 mark but with some valuable learnings!
I've come to the conclusion that to make money on the horses, you need to a) resolve any loss chasing issues and be disciplined enough to get out of bad trades fast b) Get some fast refreshing software that allows one click bets and hedging a has a ladder interface c) Get some good graphs to work with, so you can easilly visualise price moves and trends d) Keep learning
As far as football goes, I'm back to the drawing board.