alt Hacker NewsThe article appears to break gamblers into 3 groups.
1) casual players
2) problem players
3) professional gamblers.
so basically casual players gamble something like 50 bucks a year. Problem gamblers get money however they can (and although it's unstated and I have no evidence, I think this is where the actual money comes from). And finally, people that can snipe the mispriced bets, and make a lot of money.
Feels sort of submarine-ish. Casino's can't survive off casual players. They need the addicts to make payroll. The pros eat up casino margins.
I dunno. Feels like a "I run a business, but I'm not really good at it so we need laws to force the pros out". Please don't regulate me, but regulate who can play.
Interesting that it's in Bloomberg. Interesting that the casinos are so bad at laying odd they lose. I have no sympathy for anyone but the addicts. Those folks are sick and need help.
Replies
> The pros eat up casino margins.
In games against the house, the house usually ensures that even with mathematically perfect play, that they will still have a margin (though, admittedly, it's a tighter margin than when a bachelor party is drunk and playing blackjack and hitting on 19 because "I'm feeling lucky!").
Most pros play against the other players (i.e. poker, etc.), and the rake is the rake, regardless of that - the old adage, "If you look around the table and can't figure out who the chump is, you're the chump" stands, i.e. you don't have to beat the house, you just have to beat Bob who flew in from Iowa (not intended to insult anyone or anywhere, just more exaggerate the casual player).
> and although it's unstated and I have no evidence, I think this is where the actual money comes from
The article links to a WSJ article that says this group of problem players provides more than 50% of revenue to the betting companies despite being just 3% of all bettors.
> Of the more than 700,000 people in the SMU panel, fewer than 5% withdrew more from their betting apps than they deposited... The next 80% of bettors made up for those operators’ losses. And the 3% of bettors who lost the most accounted for almost half of net revenue
This is why Vegas is all about entertainment not just rows of slot machines.
I highly, highly doubt that the share of people who consistently stay in category 1 year-over-year is more than a couple percentage points. Lots of people put $50 in to try the whole thing out, lose, then never return. Extremely few people will then return in 2025 and be like "lets do that again".
I cannot for the life of me understand why these apps can't make money off the pros, and instead need to ban them. Ignoring all the dumb promotions these apps do: Sports betting is zero sum, you're betting against the other players, not the house. The odds are set by who you're betting against. Literally, how does it not work out that the profit is just the money from the losers minus the house 30%-or-whatever cut? Is "pros" in this context people who also frequently abuse the (oftentimes wild) promotions these apps run?
But, if it did work like that, the problem is even more apparent: these apps are at best a direct wealth transfer from addicts and idiots to corporations and pros. Wait, I just described the stock market, we're talking about sports betting :)
> Casino's can't survive off casual players. They need the addicts to make payroll.
The fact that the pros are simulating problem players because then the betting apps give you more leeway, e.g. by "send[ing] you bonus money" and raising your limits, paints the picture quite effectively in my book.
> Casino's can't survive off casual players. They need the addicts to make payroll
To what degree is this true? Sure, a casino with a massive spend on free alcohol and structure needs a high profit margin to return its capital. But betting apps don't have those costs.