Wouldn’t it be great if every time you placed a bet you knew you were guaranteed to win? We’re not talking about paying for selections from tipsters that are «Guaranteed to win» or «can’t be beaten,» we are talking about taking advantage of a set of circumstances that occur nearly every day which makes losing on a certain bet impossible…and this is called the Arbitrage bet.
An arbitrage betting opportunity happens when the prices between bookmakers differ enough so if all outcomes of the event are backed you are guaranteed a profit.
To take full advantage of the arbitrage bet, you will need to have accounts with a number of online bookmakers and betting exchanges, a minimum of at least two. Using bookmakers odds comparison sites- that are widely available online-you can study the prices on offer by bookmakers for certain events to see whether an arbitrage situation is available.
There are a couple of ways to make an arbitrage bet. Back one outcome to win at a bookmaker and then lay it on the exchanges, or backing an outcome at one Bookmaker, and backing the other outcome at another. The beauty of an arbitrage opportunity is you don’t need to study form, know anything about the sport, or even know anything about betting. All you need to be able to do is spot an arbitrage opportunity.
So how can you spot an arbitrage bet? Here’s a simple example: At bookies Bet777 the odds on darts player A are 6/4 to beat darts player B who is 1/2 to win the match. At Joe Blogs bookmaker the odds on player A are Evens while player B is 8/11.
The differences on prices on offer are enough to create an arbitrage. If you wanted to win £100 you would place £40 (6/4) with Bet777 to win while at Joe Bloggs bookmaker you would place a bet of £57.90 at 8/11 to win £100. So no matter who wins you are now guaranteed to win £100, but you have only bet £97.90 giving you a guaranteed profit of £2.10 or just over 2%.
This doesn’t seem an awful lot but if your stakes were say £1000 and you were placing five or six bet like this a day averaging 3% you would be making a Guaranteed profit of £150 with no risk whatever of losing.
Here’s another example on a football match with odds available on which team will score first.
Denmark v Norway
Denmark 2.88 Coral
No goals 10.00 Betfair
Norway 2.80 VCbet
Covering the three betting options cost £100. Placing a stake of £43.20 on Denmark to score first at Coral, £12.40 with Betfair on no goals and £44.40 with VCBet for Norway to score first created an arbitrage bet of over 24%.
If Denmark score first we get £43.20 x 2.88 = £124.41 minus stake of £100 = £24.41 guaranteed profit.
If no goals are scored we win £12.40 x 10 =£124.00 minus stake £100 = £24.00 guaranteed profit.
If Norway score first we win £44.40 x 2.80 = £124.32 minus stake of £100 = £24.32 guaranteed profit.
So no matter the outcome of the match a profit of over £24 is guaranteed.
With this type of bet you do need to start with a large bank as the larger the bet you can afford to place the bigger the profits you will make and get the full advantage of the arbs on offer.
If this all looks a bit complicated, or you think that spotting an arb is difficult there are aids to help you. You can find arbitrage calculators online that are free to use, this one at Arbcruncher.com will calculate the arbitrage percentage for you.
There are also companies offering arbitrage services which contact you with arbitrage bets they find on a daily basis. These arbitrage tips can be expensive however and you need to be sure you can still make a profit after paying your fees.
Arbitrage betting isn’t for everyone but if you can learn to spot the opportunities you can place bets with confidence knowing you just can’t lose.