Serious thread - Betting In Bitcoin

  • Thread starter Thread starter SlimChance
  • Start date Start date
Tell me....

1. Can you convert that sh*t into real money?
2. Is there a penalty for converting if there is?

I seriously have no clue how this virtual currency works.
 
I'm fairly sure Icebreaker was on about this a couple of years ago.The whole concept wrecks my head.
 
LUKE said:
I'm fairly sure Icebreaker was on about this a couple of years ago.The whole concept wrecks my head.
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Icebreaker is a clever lad probably more so than me but best to get on the train before it leaves the station than not at all.
 
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good luck SlimChance, the nice thing about it is that they play the game not us so of course no restrictions.
 
I'd buy some Butcoin now if I wasn't locked.

Any Bircoin layer laying Early prices wont beat any professional. By betting a sum of money invested in Bitcoin on betting you will be expected to win and offset the downside of Bircoin being worth nothing.

Think of it this way. Would any forum member in here lay me early prices? How the **** do these Bitcoin clowns think they can make money even it they lay under the market offering?
 
I'd buy some Butcoin now if I weren't locked.

Any Bitcoin layer laying Early prices wont beat any professional. By betting a sum of money invested in Bitcoin on betting you will be expected to win and offset the downside of Bircoin being worth nothing.

Think of it this way. Would any forum member in here lay me early prices? How the **** do these Bitcoin clowns think they can make money even it they lay under the market offering?
 
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i'd lay you, but i'd also want to lay someone else, basically i'll be looking of creating a book, not just having a license of bookmaking and only allowing casino and fobts.
 
Aughex said:
i'd lay you, but i'd also want to lay someone else, basically i'll be looking of creating a book, not just having a license of bookmaking and only allowing casino and fobts.
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Really? Even if I told you that no online bookmaker will take my bets? It's a bit naive of you to think you could make a book at early prices. That doesn't happen. You just lay the prices that are wrong.
 
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you don't make a book at early prices, you build towards making it during the day till the off. I know that the normal bookies don't take bets for 5-10 years, they're taking advantage of addicts and support money laundering via fobts. They fired all their odds compilers years ago and now they only make their odds from betfair. They only continue to pretend bookmaking in order for police not discover their real intentions of money laundering. Those with new accounts are allowed a 10 quid bet from what I heard, while in shops they do take your bets if they your face is not backlisted on their internal database. They also work together Lads with Hills and Coral and once you're blacklisted with one of them you'll be everywhere.

Our only options are to find a proper bookmaker(who actually takes bets and builds a book) or use betfair 10-20 minute near the start. If you think you make lots of money betting early then why not take advantage?
 
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"Serious thread - Betting In Bitcoin"

Serious question -- why would you want to?
I have yet to be offered one good justification for betting with Bitcoin. I fail to see any advantage, but I see a lot of negatives in doing so.
A for-instance: these online bitcoin books can easily be shills or frauds. Your bitcoin can be at risk if held at any of these centralised hot-wallet depositories ...... Mt Gox won't be the last outfit to "disappear" Bitcoin.

Bitocoin is fantastic if you want to trade ( in the widest sense of the word) anonymously; if you want to keep under the radar of your national Revenue service and authorities. It is also useful if you want to hire a hitman, buy drugs and guns on the darknet, or go carding. But as regards betting -- nah (unless your betting is a front for laundering funds).
Otherwise, Bitcoin is worth considering as an anonymous investment vehicle, and as a mechanism for day-trading speculation. Beyond that, and certainly for betting, it's not much cop ................. and that's from someone who is a big fan of the cryptocurrency since it was introduced in 2010.

(Anyway, on average the odds offered by these Bitcoin books are 25% lower per each horse than the overnight Betfair show price).
 
Aughex said:
you don't make a book at early prices, you build towards making it during the day till the off. I know that the normal bookies don't take bets for 5-10 years, they're taking advantage of addicts and support money laundering via fobts. They fired all their odds compilers years ago and now they only make their odds from betfair. They only continue to pretend bookmaking in order for police not discover their real intentions of money laundering. Those with new accounts are allowed a 10 quid bet from what I heard, while in shops they do take your bets if they your face is not backlisted on their internal database. They also work together Lads with Hills and Coral and once you're blacklisted with one of them you'll be everywhere.

Our only options are to find a proper bookmaker(who actually takes bets and builds a book) or use betfair 10-20 minute near the start. If you think you make lots of money betting early then why not take advantage?
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Read 6 lines of your post and stopped reading. You're talking absolute drivel.
 
icebreaker said:
"Serious thread - Betting In Bitcoin"

Serious question -- why would you want to?
I have yet to be offered one good justification for betting with Bitcoin. I fail to see any advantage, but I see a lot of negatives in doing so.
A for-instance: these online bitcoin books can easily be shills or frauds. Your bitcoin can be at risk if held at any of these centralised hot-wallet depositories ...... Mt Gox won't be the last outfit to "disappear" Bitcoin.

Bitocoin is fantastic if you want to trade ( in the widest sense of the word) anonymously; if you want to keep under the radar of your national Revenue service and authorities. It is also useful if you want to hire a hitman, buy drugs and guns on the darknet, or go carding. But as regards betting -- nah (unless your betting is a front for laundering funds).
Otherwise, Bitcoin is worth considering as an anonymous investment vehicle, and as a mechanism for day-trading speculation. Beyond that, and certainly for betting, it's not much cop ................. and that's from someone who is a big fan of the cryptocurrency since it was introduced in 2010.

(Anyway, on average the odds offered by these Bitcoin books are 25% lower per each horse than the overnight Betfair show price).
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Great post. Even at 25% less I could beat them. Max bet is one Bitcoin which is more than most books overnight.
 
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so icebreaker, the negatives you see are: can, can and could ?

"Bitocoin is fantastic if you want to trade" No, its not great to trade because of those exact reasons you gave previously, namely the orders you place and th funds are kept on the exchange site(there has been alot more security than the mtgox incident which btw had no security at all), not in your control.


"if you want to keep under the radar of your national Revenue service and authorities" you use cash, every criminal uses cash not a ledger-like payment system which has every transaction recorded into its blockchain. Bitcoin is the worst if you want to hide your ill-doings.

"I have yet to be offered one good justification for betting with Bitcoin" How about purely being capable of placing a bet. Can you name a bookmaker currently that accept your bets? I and most people I know havn't been able to place a bet in our own name for more than 5 years. The so called traditional bookies don't accept bets anymore. Betfair was the only answer, until last 1-2 years when crypto-bookies appeared on scene. And you're right they do offer worse overnight prices, thats why its only feasible to place with them if you know its gonna steam, if not its better to wait and get a BSP.
 
SlimChance said:
Even at 25% less I could brst thrm. Max bet is one Bitcoin which is more than most books overnight.
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TBH, Slim, I just think it is too much of a risk, mate. (But then, I'm a risk-averse guy in the extreme, as you well know). :)

Risky on the financial front for two reasons :
1) The very real danger of the bookie scarpering with the bitcoin. Consider for a moment that Bitcoin transactions are irreversible ........... once the transfer is made there is no chargeback available if fraud is at play. Bitcoin are also untraceable, so your lost Bitcoin are lost to you forever.
2) Bitcoin price fluctuation is highly volatile for the past 6 months. Tonight's rate on BTC-E is 258 Euro. Say you bet 1 Bitcoin tonight on a 4/1 horse; how would you feel if tomorrow's rate has dropped to 220Euro? Your 1,032 euro winnings have suddenly become only 880. That, or worse, can easily happen. So now you have the double whammy of a fair ol' loss of winnings on top of the 25% disadvantage in the odds you took.

I dunno, lad, it's your moolah, your decision. I don't want to put you off what your head and heart might want to do ........... just tread carefully is my tuppenceworth. :)
 
Aughex said:
"Bitocoin is fantastic if you want to trade" No, its not great to trade because of those exact reasons you gave previously, namely the orders you place and th funds are kept on the exchange site"
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Aughex, I emphasized "trade in the widest possible sense". By that I meant buying and selling tangible items and products.
Not just (there has been alot more security than the mtgox incident which btw had no security at all), not in your control.
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If I was ever to "trade" bitcoin again, I would only do so on the new emerging de-centralised exchanges or peer to peer with escrow.


"if you want to keep under the radar of your national Revenue service and authorities" you use cash, every criminal uses cash not a ledger-like payment system which has every transaction recorded into its blockchain.
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. I'm talking about online criminal transactions in which cash, of course, cannot be used online. Not some buying an ounce of weed on the street-corner.

"I have yet to be offered one good justification for betting with Bitcoin" How about purely being capable of placing a bet.
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What good is that if you can't be sure of getting paid your winnings? That's my word of caution( see my above post). How many of them are legit, and will you trust them with your bitcoin. In the non-bitcoin world out there there are any number of "bookmakers" who will take any bet from you, but only the naïve would risk it.

Finally,
"every criminal uses cash not a ledger-like payment system which has every transaction recorded into its blockchain. Bitcoin is the worst if you want to hide your ill-doings.
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You are so very wrong on every level with this one. Virtually every and any savvy online criminal DOES use Bitcoin by choice when doing nefarious transactions online. Silk Road and Agora and DarkMarket are built and survive on Bitcoin.



Time for meh bed. 'Night all ....................
 
icebreaker you made 2 good points for the risks, one is volatility and two the irreversible nature. But other than that, I don't know why you brought illegal and criminal activities into discussion, Bitcoin is public ledger, the police has already stopped Silk Road and no matter how decentralized Darkmarket is, police will still be able to pursue individuals if they'd really want to, what they won't be able to do is to bring the whole market down like they did Silk Road. The "weed on the street-corner" was exactly the small-timer type of criminal that was found on Silk Road market, they sold drugs, guns etc. Now if you take it up a notch on the big level where terrorists buy machine guns and heavy artillery then you won't be surprised to learn that they all use cash. Watch a vid of Mayweather(the boxer) to see how big a million dollar is. Cash is anonymous. Bitcoin is not. If criminals think they're going to escape by using Bitcoin, they're wrong. Now if you want to take it up even higher than this then please check out HSBC and Barclays(yes the BANKS) scandal that were doing money laundering at the highest level possible. Cash and banking is how big criminals exists, Bitcoin is merely a payment system with a public ledger which police is already able to identify anyone who's using it because the cash-in-out is registered with most online exchanges.

To come back to your good 2 points, volatility, I agree is dangerous, but in the last 12 months it has never changed more than 3% per 24 hours. I agree its not great but being able to place 1 btc bet on a strong fancy early on is much better than waiting for steamed BSP or having your gang of bet placers running around all over the country.

The irreversibility again is a good point, and why is a risky position to take if you're heading the way, but I have been a guinea pig for over 1 year and I can tell you that Directbet never failed to pay every single time, as soon as the result was official. They have a great automatic system in place and I haven't been left without my winnings a single time, and I placed 2-3 and even 4 BTC stakes.

There's a saying "God gave us hands but He doesn't build bridges with them", same with betting with bitcoin, bet brokers and placers, etc. you do what you have to do to survive if you have an edge.
 
Fascinating discussion Ice and Aughex. You both seem to know what you are talking about.
 
Aughex,
I have to respond and address your post, but I'm reluctant to do so; this after all is a horse racing/betting thread rather than a Bitcoin debate.
"To come back to your good 2 points, volatility, I agree is dangerous, but in the last 12 months it has never changed more than 3% per 24 hours".
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This FACTUALLY INCORRECT.
One example:
On January 14th this year, Bitcoin price dropped by 30% ............ from $244 to $173, in the space of a couple of hours. This is verifiable if you care to look it up.
(Keep in mind, also, that Bitcoin was worth $1,100 at the beginning of year 2014; today it is at $280)
　


Cash and banking is how big criminals exists
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By far the biggest mechanism for financing criminality is the American Dollar, but here's the thing: the vast percentage of trade involving the Dollar ( perhaps 7 Trillion per day) is legitimate; the majority of trade involving Bitcoin is criminal enterprise.
　


the police has already stopped Silk Road
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Dread Pirate Roberts was caught not because of his online activity, but because of his stupidity in the real world -- contracting an undercover DEA agent to carry out an assination ( one of six "hits" he attempted to organise and pay for) etc etc. His arrogance did for him. (Anyway, you are aware Silk Road v2.0 and Silk Road 3 Reloaded are up and running for quite some time now?).
　

Cash is anonymous. Bitcoin is not
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Bitcoin transactions are ledgered publicly on the blockchain, but an individual ( the Bitcoin address) associated with a transaction remains anonymous.
　



There are other pints in your post that I ought to reply to, but honestly I'm becoming tired -- and I reckon the readers of this forum are becoming bored with it. I'll just finish by wishing you well with your betting via Bitcoin in the hope it doesn't turn sour or bad. You do seem to have done well to date, which is good. Keep it up. :)
 
yes i said you were right about volatility but the point I was making it that it doesn't often make such huge drops. Even if it does make them, the exact opposite is true, meaning it could spike higher than it previously was, you are aware that it was only worth $12 in 2012 right ? $130 in Sept. 2013? and it jumped to $1000 for a short space of time in Nov 2013.

I won't continue with the criminal discussions, point I was making is that criminals use whatever payment system, bitcoin is not a heaven match made them, nor is cash, if police really wants to catch someone. Oh and from the 100,000-200,000 daily bitcoin transactions I am sure not more than 1% are criminal. There are so many legit websites out there and big businesses(Tigerdirect, Amazon, Overstock.com, etc) that amount for the majority of the daily activity.

"You do seem to have done well to date, which is good. Keep it up" Thanks! I was only trying to help others by giving the other side of the argument. I am pretty happy whenever I use bitcoin to place bets. I accept the volatility because I count 1 btc = 1 btc, otherwise look how weak the gbp vs usd looks as well: http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=GBP&to=USD&view=1Y similar to bitcoin http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=XBT&to=USD&view=1Y
 
Great points made by Icebreaker there but you can restrict risk to simply the fluctuation of odds prior to SP, although by the sound of it you're not concerned about that.

You're taking on three forms of risk;

1. Market risk : Odds may go against you but is obviously reduced or mitigated entirely if you're knowledgeable enough to be sure you'll be beating SP.
2. Counterparty risk : You have no control over this as Bitcoin hold your funds. The company disappears and so does your cash.
3. Currency risk : Icebreaker explains above.

There are however peer to peer based trading companies out there that will let you short sell the company, effectively hedging against items 2 & 3. Of course you'll need to pay transaction fees and may be required to put up collateral; i.e. initial margin plus regularly adjusted variation margin as the share price fluctuates.

But if you're as desperate as you say...
 
Great thread and interesting stuff. Read up on Bitcoin about a year ago but wasn't aware there were bookmakers trading with it.
 
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