Given the political implications of the rise in commodity prices, this is not the best environment in which to begin regulating markets like election contracts, but the consensus that seems to be building on the relevant questions is rather auspicious. Hedgestreet and I have presented similar legal and regulatory frameworks to allow for at least the types of election contracts we are familiar with through sites like Intrade. Given Hedgestreet’s vigorous and incisive comments, I regret not having argued more for the desirability of non-intermediated exchanges.

In their focus, however, Hedgestreet steered clear of the gaming pre-emption questions and did not present a comprehensive and general framework for event markets. In that respect, their broaching of the CFTC’s plenary option authority opens more questions than it answers, but several interesting and important markets could perhaps be traded without answering all such questions.

I encourage Hedgestreet to begin working with the NFA to develop the infrastructure necessary for the types of trading prohibitions that we each described in our comments. I encourage the CFTC to act decisively in light of the self-evident and massive value of certain event markets — even with the current political pressures, which are mainly relevant to event markets on a superficial level. Perhaps if the CFTC deems that an exercise of emergency powers is necessary at some point, that would be an appropriate day to also make a decision on event contracts public.

We are at a specific point where a little bit of additional regulation might cause an explosion in legal prediction markets, and possibly soon. As a libertarian, I generally dislike regulation, and of course it’s true, pretty much by definition, that over-regulation is bad, but I don’t believe that to be the most effective message for this comment process and the unique opportunity it presents.

Commodity Futures Trading Commission
Three Lafayette Centre
1155 21st St. N.W.
Washington DC 20581
Attention: Office of the Secretariat

Re: Concept Release on the Appropriate Regulatory Treatment of Event Contracts

JURISDICTION AND EVENT MARKETS IN GENERAL

Given the explicit statutory definitions of “excluded” and “exempt” commodities, it is reasonable to conclude that the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (“CFTC”) has jurisdiction over all exchange-traded event markets. That is, if an “occurrence, extent of occurrence or contingency” does not meet the additional “beyond the control” and “economic consequence” criteria, then contracts on such events should be considered exempt commodities. While currently all exempt commodities are associated with a deliverable other than cash, the open-ended definition of “exempt commodity” considered alongside the definitions of “commodity” and “excluded commodity” in 7 U.S.C. § 1a imply that contracts on events that are not beyond the control of participants or do not involve an outcome of economic consequence are exempt commodities.

This conclusion presents enforcement issues that the CFTC may wish to avoid, such as being obligated to pursue actions against exchanges offering contracts based on the outcome of sporting events. Unfortunately, without further statutory clarification, this conclusion seems like the most defensible one, based on the letter, if not the intent, of the law.

That said, until statutory clarification is attained, given the purposes and history of the Commodity Exchange Act (“CEA”), it would be appropriate for the CFTC to only assert jurisdiction over those event contracts satisfying “economic consequence” criteria, which would include the price discovery aspect of the former economic purpose test. An interpretation to this effect by the CFTC would not be inconsistent with the text of the CEA, and would best serve to minimize the burden on interstate commerce. This policy decision would effectively reconstitute the pre-Commodity Futures Modernization Act economic purpose test for event contracts in a way that avoids unwanted enforcement issues. Such a decision would be unlikely to meet significant resistance until such time that further statutory certainty is forthcoming.

The CFTC would be free to classify such contracts as either excluded or exempt commodities depending on their susceptibility to manipulation, before or after special trading prohibitions are in place. Although the anti-manipulation requirements that apply to exempt commodities are directed towards price manipulation, a fortiori they must also apply to outcome manipulation.¹

The CFTC is free to determine what qualifies as “economic consequence.” As with the economic purpose test, significant hedging and price discovery functions would comprise the principal criteria.² Regarding the latter, since event derivatives have no corresponding “cash” markets, the origination of prices that may improve economic decisions is all the more desirable in these cases. Furthermore, events that may only directly affect a group of private individuals may also have a strong bearing on commercial decision-making. Note that some general events and measures, as categorized and listed by the CFTC in its Concept Release, do in fact correspond to economic measures.³ Even if these events do not predictably correlate with asset prices, they may have predictable effects on market volatility. For example, from 1980 through present, the annualized weekly volatility of the S&P 500 in weeks in which a presidential or mid-term election took place was 19.97%, vs. 15.34% for all other weeks.⁴ It is difficult and ultimately undesirable to provide a quantitative recommendation for a bright-line demarcation between those markets that would satisfy an economic consequence criterion and those that would not. However, if a significant statistical test can easily be found that includes the price series of a more familiar asset, and has a logical basis, we can reasonably say that such events are associated with an economic consequence. In many cases the relevant time series may be unavailable, but in those cases the applicability of a proposed event market to other assets may be obvious. For example, consider a market predicting the likelihood of: (1) ethanol-related legislation, and its relationship to corn prices, or (2) offshore drilling legislation, and its relationship to oil prices, or (3) an attack on Iran, and its relationship to oil prices, or (4) future tax rates, and its relationship to municipal bond prices. In such cases, no quantitative test is necessary. In other cases, we may have moderately strong reasons to suspect that a given event or measure has an impact on asset prices, as we do with demographic trends, but those effects may be difficult to measure empirically.

Many potential markets may improve decision-making for a particular business, but have little bearing on the broader economy and asset prices in general. Examples of these markets include those predicting: (1) the revenue of a particular product, published title, film or performance series, (2) the launch or completion date of a particular product or project, and (3) the success of a particular approach applied to certain problem. The CFTC may find that only broad-based events or measures affecting an entire population, industry or significant percentage thereof would satisfy the economic consequence criteria. This would be nothing new, as commodity derivatives were not intended to be specialized insurance contracts. Such narrow questions also present issues from a manipulation and insider-trading perspective. In aggregate, these sorts of questions are quite relevant to the economy and will at times reflect broad trends, but may be more appropriately served by over-the-counter arrangements or riskless information aggregation, despite the obvious advantages of market incentives.

Contracts satisfying economic consequence criteria need not be approved for listing by the CFTC, though it is hoped that guidelines will be made public and remain flexible. At the limit, the CFTC will recognize that even a purely speculative market might serve an economic purpose in reducing portfolio variance.

Additionally:

The CFTC might levy a special fee on regulated event contracts to recoup expenditures related to a trading prohibition facility and other special demands on resources.

It may be required that exchanges pay interest on binary event contract collateral in order to reduce price distortions near extreme prices (100% and 0%). In illiquid markets, such distortions could be used to disguise transfers of money between anonymous participants.

The CFTC should welcome Securities and Exchange Commission opinion on contracts based on events like earnings and dividend announcements, a group of which might begin to replicate a security. Whenever a market is proposed that reflects the cash flow of a particular business or property, this opinion may be relevant.

To the extent that they subsequently conform to the CEA and CFTC policy, amnesty for any past violations should be considered with respect to Intrade and similar exchanges that have operated legally in their domestic jurisdictions.

ELECTION AND POLICY EVENT CONTRACTS

Election and policy event markets are within the jurisdiction of the CFTC based on the letter and spirit of the CEA. These markets represent the largest reasonably predictable yet unhedgeable risk facing businesses and the public. The regulation of such markets follows from the history of enlightened, flexible innovation exemplified by the CFTC. Because of their importance, election and policy event contracts naturally involve special consideration, although only in the course of satisfying the CEA.

Considering election contracts:

Trading prohibitions should be established such that candidates and proxies cannot participate due to their ability to determine the outcome of the contract. In addition to adhering to the “beyond the control” requirement of excluded commodities and general anti-manipulation precepts, the CFTC will want to consider to what extent such prohibitions might be expanded to act as insider trading restrictions similar in form to those of 7 U.S.C. § 13(f) or the proposed H.R. 2341.⁵ Especially given the all-or-nothing nature of many event contracts, this might be desirable in order to provide for fair and equitable trading.⁶

Upon the death of a candidate, the candidate’s contracts and those of all competitors must settle on the last known price before the event. A new set of contracts reflecting the new set of candidates could subsequently be offered.⁷

Analogous rules could be applied to policy and legislative contracts where appropriate. These rules, either directly administered by the CFTC and related associations, and/or required of exchanges, would firmly address outcome manipulation.

Because of their importance and sensitivity, these contracts also require special measures to ensure against price manipulation. However, it is important to note that election and policy markets have typically been traded as binary event options. Such contracts expire at a specific time according to a well-defined objective event and in that way are more resistant to manipulation than futures and perpetuities, the prices of which are unbound in one direction and always open to interpretation based on unobservable factors and developments in related markets. At the same time, the relative detachment of event contracts from the web of more familiar asset prices may make manipulation more difficult to prove.

As would be expected, large trader lists could be maintained and closely followed. A more powerful option is the enforcement of extraordinarily low position limits, which would greatly reduce the potential of price manipulation. At the same time, position limits should respect outstanding risks participants may have and be otherwise unable to hedge, as with traditional hedging and speculative limits. Low position limits also address trader protection concerns if such contracts were to be offered in a non-intermediated fashion. Leverage might likewise be limited. Several tiers of opt-out protection could be available to traders of various capitalization and expertise. Contracts might also be restricted to limit orders in order to curb short-term feedback trading.

Election and policy contracts ought to be restricted to domestic accounts only. This will avoid possible extradition problems where disciplinary action is required. In the case of event contracts that may reflect tax rates, this restriction will also determine that the Department of the Treasury will not lose revenue on a net basis.⁸

FLEXIBLE LEGAL IMPLEMENTATION

Instead of, or in addition to, claiming jurisdiction over some event markets, the CFTC has at its disposal a range of public interest exemptions, including some that interpret the 7 U.S.C. § 6(c)3(K)⁹ qualification clause liberally in order to include participants who might not normally trade in traditional futures and options markets. From my perspective, such exemptions may allow for a more flexible development of event markets in a less heavily-regulated environment. For example, it might allow for a contract in research science claims where trader-researchers capable of determining the outcome are not readily identifiable, or provide for trading in the sorts of narrow, business-specific questions previously mentioned. From the CFTC’s perspective, a public interest exemption may be desirable in order to avoid making a firm jurisdictional claim. However, the outcome of this comment process should be a decisive policy statement from the CFTC, not a sequence of ad-hoc actions. It is hoped that any future public interest exemptions would be offered alongside a substantial list of requirements and guidelines that would at least signal jurisdiction over a class of event markets possessing certain characteristics. Legal certainty is perhaps the most important outcome in this process, and it is not desirable for the CFTC to extend exemptions in a manner that leaves its jurisdiction completely ambiguous with respect to the markets so exempted.

This leaves aside the question of who may operate such markets. If exempted exchanges are to operate for profit, a jurisdictional statement from the CFTC is all the more necessary in order to ensure their legal standing. Exemptions directed at non-profits may be superfluous from a perspective of legal certainty, especially if such exchanges only offer trading in States where the predominant factor test holds.

The CEA allows that public interest exemptions may be issued for specified time periods. The CFTC may wish to consider to what extent exemptive or no-action letters with renew-by dates attached might be a useful tool in light of evolving legal conditions and technologies.

Note that theoretically the CFTC could also assert jurisdiction over all event markets and then direct no-action letters to the finite list of sports and gaming exchanges as a facility to repudiate jurisdiction over such markets. Typically, exempting markets formed principally for speculation would be considered against the public interest. However, if the CFTC finds no satisfactory way under the CEA to take jurisdiction over only those event markets that are associated with economic consequences, no-actioning sports and gaming exchanges would be in the public interest on a net basis, and would best promote interstate commerce. Furthermore, in some cases such exchanges operate under their own regulatory bodies and protections. It is also seldom that such exchanges allow for leveraged trading by beginner participants. In general, most gaming takes place via over-the-counter transactions.

THE PUBLIC INTEREST

I have neglected to argue for event markets in terms of the public interests they promote as these facts have been covered by others and have no doubt been obvious to the CFTC for a long time. I will only note some cases that are more subtle:

Information and estimates can be revealed in conditional form, as in the “decision markets” hosted on Intrade.¹⁰ One such market pays 100% if a Democrat is elected President in 2008 and the national debt rises in the calendar year preceding October 2011. Since the probability of the former event is also available on Intrade, by P(A | B) = P(A & B) / P(B), we can say that the probability of a Democratic president leading to a rise in the national debt is the decision market price divided by the election market price. This type of market is thus able to predict the result of electoral or legislative decisions, and different decisions can be so compared. With this in mind, consider that while prediction markets are usually described as ways to aggregate information, they are likely also useful in terms of collective problem-solving, even in cases where all information is transparent.

In terms of risk-sharing, eventually the utility of political event markets might begin to address some well-known problems with representative government. Consider the typical special interest problem in which a few relatively well-funded individuals would gain heavily by a particular piece of legislation such as an industry subsidy, and so will lobby heavily for it. Even if the legislation is not in the public interest, the costs will be distributed over so many tax payers that they will not care to argue against it, and most will not even realize what’s happening. When mature legislative and public policy markets are in place: (1) the dispersed interests will have the recourse of hedging against policy they dislike, (2) special interests will also have the option of hedging their legislative fortunes, which might lead to an overall reduction in lobbying, and (3) legislators may find compromises to be easier, since interests would be able to voluntarily “meet each other half way,” with price being the arbitrator. This could ease political log-jams, making law-making itself more flexible and efficient. Sensible yet otherwise politically infeasible measures such as unwinding entrenched subsidies could be made viable.

Even if iterations are required, the outcome of this comment process should be a clear statutory interpretation and policy statement from the CFTC regarding event markets. The CFTC should also publish self-certification guidelines for those markets that it determines are within its jurisdiction. Once jurisdiction and/or a public interest exemption framework is determined, it should not be ambiguous whether, for example, a contract based on a presidential election would be approved by the CFTC in principle.

There is good deal of apprehension among those who study prediction markets that regulation will stifle innovation. In truth, exchange requirements may not be as onerous as they are often portrayed, and in most cases are perfectly appropriate. A related, implied fear is that the CFTC may not approve certain contracts such as those on election and legislative events that undeniably possess economic purpose due only to their political sensitivity and considerations of the CFTC’s source of authorization and funding. I hope that this process will assuage such fears. I encourage the CFTC to act decisively and comprehensively in accordance with its purposes.

Sincerely,
Jason Ruspini

Footnotes:

¹ For example, a market on infrequent terrorist attacks would not be approved for the simple reason that outcome manipulators could not reliably be identified beforehand.
² cf. Robert Hahn and Paul Tetlock, “A New Approach for Regulating Information Markets,” AEI-Brookings Joint Center Working Paper (December 2004).
³ Justin Wolfers and Eriz Zitzewitz, “Using Markets to Inform Policy: The Case of the Iraq War,” NBER Working Paper (June 2004).
Justin Wolfers, Erik Snowberg and Eric Zitzewitz. “Partisan Impacts on the Economy: Evidence from Prediction Markets and Close Elections,” NBER Working Paper (March 2006).
Erik Snowberg, Justin Wolfers and Eric Zitzewitz, “Party Influence in Congress and the Economy,” Quarterly Journal of Political Science: Vol. 2: No 3, pp 277-286 (2007).
⁴ F-test (α = 0.1126). If we instead only consider the Wednesdays following election day compared to all other days over this same period, α = 0.0246.
⁵ The “Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act”.
⁶ Trading prohibitions on insiders will also avoid a situation in which candidates are able to enjoy a multiplier effect on their campaign funds by shorting themselves. For example, Candidate A has a campaign fund of $2, and candidate B has $1. By hedging, candidate A can maintain a $2 risk while spending $4 on campaigning while candidate B can only spend $2 to maintain a $1 risk.
⁷ cf. Intrade rules. A more challenging possible scenario involves manipulation preceding the event such that the forced settlement locks-in profits, presumably just as market power is exhausted. See note below on restricting market access to US-based accounts.
⁸ Such restrictions would however tend to limit the growth of such markets and/or result in risk premia accruing to short tax-rate positions.
⁹ “Such other persons that the Commission determines to be appropriate in light of their financial or other qualifications, or the applicability of appropriate regulatory protections.”
¹⁰ For background, see: Robin Hanson, “Decision Markets for Policy Advice,” Promoting the General Welfare: New Perspectives on Government Performance, pp 151-173, Brookings Institution Press (November 2006).

Out of the 13 news stories listed under the prediction market on the CFTC licensing event markets, not a single one … NOT A SINGLE ONE… covers that issue. They are general news about futures exchanges in general, and their regulations.

TAKEAWAY: It’s all an art to pick up the right keywords.

QUESTION: I wonder whether HubDub can take a whole phrase as a keyword. The phrase “event markets” would give different results than the 2 separate keywords, “event” and “markets”.

-

One question is whether there is a way to usefully systematize that principle by trader selection or via something other than a strict market such as an (incentivised) weighted average system like HP’s BRAIN. The latter type of system will work better in some domains but in general might be less robust because it constantly runs the danger of being overfit to past trader correlations (or apparent expertise, risk appetites, etc). In general, trader self-selection and self-weighting might be more accurate. If you have some metric of “fundamental” trader similarity like proximity, org chart relations, demographic data – as opposed to past trading correlations only, that might work better in terms of expert-selection/expert-weighting.

I am pleased to note that Mat Fogarty (Founder and CEO, Xpree) and Alexander Costakis (Managing Director, HSX) have been added to the program.

Please get in touch with me (cigar@ku.edu) if you are interested in attending or have any questions.

Schedule

8:30 Registration, Coffee, Opening Remarks

9:00 Lessons from Corporate Applications of Prediction Markets

Henry Berg, Microsoft

Discussant: Robin Hanson (George Mason Department of Economics)

Christina Ann LaComb, GE (The Imagination Market; abstract is free, text is gated)

Discussant: Marco Ottaviani (Kellogg School of Management, Management and Strategy)

10:45 Coffee Break

11:00 Lessons from Corporate Applications of Prediction Markets (cont)

Dawn Keller, Best Buy (Best Buy’s TAGTRADE Market)

Discussant: Paul Rhode (Department of Economics. Eller College of Management, University of Arizona)

Bo Cowgill, Google (Putting Crowd Wisdom to Work)

Discussant: Eric Zitzewitz (Dartmouth Department of Economics)

12:45 Lunch

Keynote address: Jim Lavoie, Co-Founder and CEO, Rite-Solutions

1:45 Lessons from Prediction Market Organizers and Operators

John Delaney, Founder and CEO, Intrade

David Perry, Co-Founder and President, Consensus Point

Mat Fogarty, Founder and CEO, Xpree Inc

3:15 Break (refreshments)

3:30 The Legal Playing Field

Tom W. Bell, Chapman University School of Law

Discussant: Robert E. Litan (VP Research and Policy at the Kauffman Foundation, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, Director of the AEI-Brookings Joint Center on Regulatory Studies)

4:15 General Discussion

Alexander Costakis (Managing Director, Hollywood Stock Exchange) will also be available to answer questions and may make a short presentation.

The preliminary schedule is listed below:

Schedule

8:30 Registration, Coffee, Opening Remarks

9:00 Lessons from Corporate Applications of Prediction Markets

Henry Berg, Microsoft

Discussant: Robin Hanson (George Mason Department of Economics)

Christina Ann LaComb, GE (The Imagination Market; abstract is free, text is gated)

Discussant: Marco Ottaviani (Kellogg School of Management, Management and Strategy)

10:45 Coffee Break

11:00 Lessons from Corporate Applications of Prediction Markets (cont)

Dawn Keller, Best Buy (Best Buy’s TAGTRADE Market)

Discussant: Paul Rhode (Department of Economics. Eller College of Management, University of Arizona)

Bo Cowgill, Google (Putting Crowd Wisdom to Work)

Discussant: Eric Zitzewitz (Dartmouth Department of Economics)

12:30 Lunch

Keynote address: Jim Lavoie, Co-Founder and CEO, Rite-Solutions

1:45 Lessons from Prediction Market Organizers and Operators

John Delaney, Founder and CEO, Intrade

David Perry, Co-Founder and President, Consensus Point

3:00 Break (refreshments)

3:15 The Legal Playing Field

Tom W. Bell, Chapman University School of Law

Discussant: Robert E. Litan (VP Research and Policy at the Kauffman Foundation, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, Director of the AEI-Brookings Joint Center on Regulatory Studies)

4:00 General Discussion

6:30 Dinner

Location TBA

Public traded companies acting marketmakers. fair?

alika 08 Aug 10:41
A Swedish public company traded on the stock market is claiming that they are getting payed for acting as a market maker at Betfair. If this is true I guess Betfair is not that fair anymore. How can other players and traders compete on a levelled playfield when paying commission? All be that they might have a discount. Now they also took away the Asian handicap rate of 1%. The small-time gamblers and traders are just getting screwed in my opinion. Betfair using external market makers is practically the same as they would set their odds themselves. Killing their own business idea? What do you think?
Thanks

alika 08 Aug 10:54
They repeatedly claimed, “Betfair is their customer”. (Not the other way around) I am not sure if this is being said in the English version website. But is here is other Swedish speakers, they can confirm what I am saying.

http://www.bettingpromotion.se/eng/index.php

wonby10 08 Aug 11:16
Thank you I had a good read particularly the analysis. IMO this company is probably operating a BOT across multi platforms and exchanges. Make the market and consequently have a large bet volume by bet and probably by amount relying on turnover for small margins and as such have probably negotiated their commision with a number of betting exchanges. They need the exchanges to make their money and can only make the markets on the exchanges where they know the traders other bots are. I don’t think it’s an issue.

alika 08 Aug 11:25
“couldn’t find any mention of betfair on the swedish site” Strange, not me either. However, it is very well insinuated among the investors. That Betfair is their customer. First I did not belive it, but I have changed my mind. It would be very good if Betfair made a statement clearing all speculations about what is going on.

Blazes 08 Aug 13:01
Have seen from analyst presentations that IG are active on Betfair. They claim that their profits from BF were of the order of £100,000 a month. Suspect that they just have something that routes the prices they normally make to BF automatically whereas on their own site there will be a margin built in. If thay are paying somebody to make a market it makes sense to have as many outlets for that as possible.

Eldrick 08 Aug 17:39
1% on asian handicaps and total goals scrapped as of tomorrow, see markets section in announcements

http://www.iggroup.com/content/ii_transcript_jan06.html

“market-making on exchanges…We made about £100,000 from this in December. Maybe some element of fluke there, but it is not trivial or experimental anymore.” with some back of a postcard calcs, i reckon they make more like 15-20k average per month from football

Eldrick 08 Aug 18:01

http://www.iggroup.com/content/ii_transcript_nov06.html

“The business of market-making on betting exchanges is now a business that over the last four months, up to and including December, has averaged £150,000 a month of revenue…”
this transcript relates to results announced in jan 07, so thats 600k profit from sept-dec 2006 inclusive
given they made £6m from sports in total last year (stated in same report) that’s a very big chunk of their profits

Col Archaius Tory 08 Aug 19:50
Betfair admitted a few years ago to a parliamentary select commitee that they had seeded markets as part of their marketing spend. This is old news. As for giving the seeder an ”edge,” 0% commission could be deemed (perhaps part of) payment for services rendered rather than an edge. I’m told Betfair used to use this Swedish company to try to build up liquidity in their fringe markets, but a Betfair employee (preferably noe with a good past track record on unilaterally declaring their links with Betfair) might be the best person to verify this or otherwise.

nutter punter 08 Aug 21:53
Plant,
Don’t be such a complete tool and look with your own eyes. It is easily the most obvious sign of a MM that you see as soon as a market is reopened and no api application can place a bet as quickly as they do. This includes STW, Bet Angel and Betting assistant. They have their own access to Betfair and they take full advantage. I might add they also offer ***** prices So which morons give them £100,000 profit a month? Also get over yourself with you work for Betfair so it must be true. I guess all those people at Barings who were reassured, as Mr Leeson ran an exceptionally dodgy derivatives position, slept well at night.

Plant 08 Aug 22:27
Nutter,
You claim above that BF are giving one customer a bet placement edge. I am simply telling you that I asked this question to the people within BF who would know the answer and they categorically denied this claim. I choose to believe them. You can call me a tool and all the names under the sun. I’m not going to engage in personal abuse. I do however find your comment above (“Betfair now clearly has no regard for its core users, the private punter.”) amusing, given on a thread below on this forum (“Caution, trap bets on site now”) you are bragging about successfully laying trap bets: “Some mug always gives me a few hundred per day by not paying attention.” Sounds to me like the ‘private punter’ on here has enough problems on his plate with people like you on the site.
Plant

nutter punter 09 Aug 00:20
Plant
Don’t embarass yourself. If you can’t work out I was taking the **** in that other thread then either you are not that clever or don’t work for Betfair ( you could clearly check my account and see if my story and my trap bets are true ). I just like winding up retards on here who think trap bets are really scary when clearly they could just dime them.
My feeling is that you have very little understanding of how the MM’s price up these markets and which are their odds? Am I correct in thinking that you couldn’t even give me a clue as to the size of an av. IG bet? or their % between bid/offer? Which markets they operate in? When they suspend in markets that Betfair leaves as open from start to finish?
So since you have no idea which numbers are theirs in terms of odds and stake how the **** would you know if they have an advantage? Oh no sorry you aksed some bloke/bird, you supposedly work with. LOL you are a complete tool.
So getting back to the thread I know for a fact that IG have a distinct advantage in the markets they price up, with the ability to enter odds into those markets quicker than any regular customer.

Feck N. Eejit 09 Aug 09:49
It’s no shock that ig are trading on here when you consider MM’s have 5 or 6 seconds to cancel their bets while the offer takers are stuck behind the clock (were they to operate similarly on their own site they’d lose their licence). It would be a shock however if ig were able to override the delay and stick up their trap bets in front of decent hard working trapping s c u m or snap up the offers of other shell and pea merchants before they had the chance to cancel. All at 0% commission. Oh dear.

Plant 09 Aug 12:11
Feck, they are not on 0%.
Nutter, the comment I challenged was your claim that “There is another company seeding markets that is allowed to place bets before the 5sec count after a market is reopened” I am saying that is false. To use a Feck analogy, I would be prepared to bet my daughter’s life that it were false, would you be prepared to take the reverse bet?

bot 09 Aug 12:24
A good example of what’s wrong with this forum. No one has “special access” to markets and it’s incomprehensible why someone would suggest that. Either nutter punter is innocently mistaken (in which case it’s inexcusable to put up a false allegation like that on the forum without checking the facts) or he’s deliberately attempting to put people away which is worse. In either case I think we need to come down harder on people who tell lies on here, otherwise this place loses whatever integrity it still has.

nutter punter 09 Aug 12:26
I use Betting Assistant but if you had read my posts you would see that I have tried the other applications to see if they were any quicker. They were not. Betting assistant is actually one of the most adaptable applications available and does everything I require of it. Aside from having a couple of extra macros to run bots on variuous markets I find the product great.

bot 09 Aug 12:35
So when you say that you know “for a fact” that a named company is provided by Betfair with privileged access the basis of that is that you’ve tried a handful of off the shelf software packages and you haven’t been first in the queue when placing a bet. That’s hardly knowing something for a fact is it? It’s a pretty weak basis to be making such a serious and untrue allegation. If you’d said you had a cranky but unrealistic theory then that’s one thing. Telling whoppers is a different kettle of fish entirely.

bot 09 Aug 13:35
So you’ve tried a handful of products which have broad functionality, none of which is optimised for getting bets into the market the split second they unsuspend, and on that basis you’ve decided that someone else must have privileged access to get bets to market before you? You’ve got to be kidding. At least if you’d honestly said that you suspected something someone would undoubtedly have explained why your conclusion was illogical. Instead you’ve preferred to claim that you knew things “for a fact” when quite obviously you knew nothing of the sort, and when pulled up on it you haven’t even had the decency to come clean. I can’t think of a single company that would continue to allow you to abuse their facilities by posting such blatant lies on their forum and misleading other users in this way.

getting better 14 Aug 15:05
I don’t see any problem either with third parties acting as MMs. I don’t like the idea of companies seeding themselves, as they can palp bets that they have offered in error, or give themselves a time advantage, which can be unfair. I am glad Betfair does not seed markets themselves and ensures a level playing field for everyone.