Betting on sports online has come to stay. Sure, the governments around the world are trying to crack down on the industry, but people will always find a way to bet and it is only a matter of time before it legalized all around the world. For those that have the opportunity to bet right now, one of the most important aspects of betting, and betting for winning money, is bankroll management.
Bankroll management is the act of betting the optimal amount so as to win the most amount depending on the amount of risk you want to take on. This betting amount can be found by many different ways. The ones that is used by the great investors and sports betting syndicates, is the Kelly Criterion. This method bets an amount depending on the edge of your bet and the odds received. The thing with this method is that it bets an amount that always is a percentage of your bankroll, so this makes it almost impossible to go bankrupt if you can follow it diligently. However, this betting strategy is quite aggressive and will likely have you swinging wildly about your expected return.
There are alternatives to this betting strategy. One is a derivative of the Kelly Criterion, where one bets a smaller fraction of the optimal Kelly fraction. This is often used by other bettors, where you bet for example half the optimal Kelly. This will reduce the variance greatly, while still give a good return (although it will be quite a lot lower).
Another bankroll strategy is to bet a fixed percentage of your bankroll on every play, for example 2-5%. The good thing about this strategy is that you also may never go bankrupt, as you continuously update your bet size as your bankroll changes. The return here is also somewhat smaller than with the Kelly strategy, but it is a lot easier than Kelly, seeing you do not need to calculate your edge, only use a constant rate of betting percentage.
The problem with these betting strategies is that they are hard to follow to a tee, and this is where most of the problems come with sports bettors and the reason that they go broke. Even with a small bankroll of $1000, you can still grow this to a respectable bankroll that you can earn a living on, if you only continue to bet disciplined, however, this is harder said than done. So being disciplined is a big part of bankroll management. Study some zen methods would probably be a wise idea as well.
Bankroll management is the act of betting the optimal amount so as to win the most amount depending on the amount of risk you want to take on. This betting amount can be found by many different ways. The ones that is used by the great investors and sports betting syndicates, is the Kelly Criterion. This method bets an amount depending on the edge of your bet and the odds received. The thing with this method is that it bets an amount that always is a percentage of your bankroll, so this makes it almost impossible to go bankrupt if you can follow it diligently. However, this betting strategy is quite aggressive and will likely have you swinging wildly about your expected return.
There are alternatives to this betting strategy. One is a derivative of the Kelly Criterion, where one bets a smaller fraction of the optimal Kelly fraction. This is often used by other bettors, where you bet for example half the optimal Kelly. This will reduce the variance greatly, while still give a good return (although it will be quite a lot lower).
Another bankroll strategy is to bet a fixed percentage of your bankroll on every play, for example 2-5%. The good thing about this strategy is that you also may never go bankrupt, as you continuously update your bet size as your bankroll changes. The return here is also somewhat smaller than with the Kelly strategy, but it is a lot easier than Kelly, seeing you do not need to calculate your edge, only use a constant rate of betting percentage.
The problem with these betting strategies is that they are hard to follow to a tee, and this is where most of the problems come with sports bettors and the reason that they go broke. Even with a small bankroll of $1000, you can still grow this to a respectable bankroll that you can earn a living on, if you only continue to bet disciplined, however, this is harder said than done. So being disciplined is a big part of bankroll management. Study some zen methods would probably be a wise idea as well.
