by John Ross

Discussions about bots and trading applications crop up regularly on the Betfair General Betting forum and while an increasing number of punters are becoming familiar with technology available to aid the process of placing bets and trading markets, there are still many who remain unaccustomed with the concept altogether.

So, what are bots and trading applications?

Well, it’s probably best to start by addressing the latter because there’s much more to say about trading applications as they’re much more readily available from a variety of suppliers nowadays.

A trading application is a piece of software that is designed to aid or automate your betting. At their most basic, trading applications allow you to place your bets on Betfair at the click of a button. At their most complex, they offer you an array of information that is not readily available on the standard Betfair screen.

There are several trading applications available to buy off the shelf while some programmers offer their own versions free of charge.

So let’s start by looking at the standard procedure for placing a bet on an exchange, which is a three-stage process: you first click on the odds you wish to back or lay, you then enter your stake in the empty box provided and then, finally, you hit the submit button.

However, a trading application can compress this process. It can replicate the Betfair screen and allow you to place a bet with one click of a button, commonly known as ‘one-click trading’. With one click trading, you pre-select your stake then click on the odds and your bet is automatically placed.

Two such applications that cost nothing and allow you to do this are Bet Angel (www.betangel.com) and Betfair Trader (http://gruss.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk). Another helpful feature with both of these applications is that you can select the odds in all three columns of the back or lay side, not just the first odds in the queue. And both of them also allow you to set the refresh rate from one second upwards.

Bet Angel also allows you to set a maximum liability, which can always come in handy whenever you drop a clanger by getting your back and lay buttons confused! As far as Bet Angel goes, that’s about it – but it’s free of charge and available as a download from their website.

Betfair Trader is also free but it goes a lot further in what it can actually achieve because it offers built-in ‘dutching’ and ‘trading’ options.

For the dutching option, you can focus on a particular race and select, say for example, four horses you believe have a chance of winning. You enter a total overall figure you want to win and the program will indicate when you can place the bet to achieve that profit, automatically selecting the stake required on each horse. The trading option allows you to split your profit or loss between all selections at the touch of a button.

For those interested in downloading this particular program, there is a long-running thread by LayItYouMug on the General Betting forum that is now over 30 pages in length. It’s under the title ‘One-click trading – free program coming soon’ and it makes intriguing reading if you wish to find out how this program has developed during the last six months since it was launched.

Another interesting piece of software currently available is Bet Trader Pro (http://www.racingtraders.com).

This program displays a ladder with the full range of Betfair odds displayed. The best three odds available (back and lay) are displayed within that ladder but you can place a bet anywhere on the ladder and it will be matched should the odds reach that point.

You also have a pad at the bottom of the screen that allows you to set up to six different pre-defined betting amounts. Click on one, then set the odds you want to place your bet at and the bet will be immediately placed at that price. The program has a hedging button that allows you to split your profit or loss across all selections.

The only real drawback to this program is that you can only see the first three runners in any given market. However, it’s only fair to point out that this software is primarily intended for trading the first three horses in the market and, as such, is perfect for that common system of betting.

The program uses the Betfair API (Application Programming Interface) and offers live streaming so that prices appear almost instantly as they are submitted. The program is available on subscription at £29.95 per month and the website has a video that shows how to use the program to the best of its abilities. A free trial is also available.

Bet Angel (http://www.betangel.com) also offer a professional version of their free program, called Bet Angel Pro, which has a host of added features that the free version doesn’t have.

You can track prices leading up to an event and the program will continue to project whether the price is likely to rise or fall, in real time. It also has a ‘fill or kill’ option, which means that if any of your bet is not immediately matched, the rest will be cancelled. Another useful feature is the stop loss functionality.

If the odds start to drift away from you, the program will kick-in at a pre-selected point to stop any further potential losses. Combine this with a whole array of charts and indicators and you have a wealth of information to draw on. It costs £199 for installation and then £19.99 per month.

Finally, we take a look at Sports Trader Workstation (http://www.stw-sportstrader.co.uk). The features for this application are almost endless and it’s abundantly clear that the package has had a lot of thought put into it.

In fact, according to the producers of the package, this is more than just a trading application – it’s the next generation of the betting exchange interface!

One particular feature not included in the other programs is an option called ‘scalping’, which will automatically oppose any bet you place on the opposite side of the back or lay a couple of ticks away, and then split the resulting profit automatically. This is very handy for punters who wish to be in and out of a market rather sharpish.

It also comes with a powerful dutching facility that enables you to back or lay several selections to win or lose and it includes real time calculators so that you can see instantly projected expectations.

You can also view different markets on the same screen if you wish to gain an overall view of your current positions. Again, this program uses the Betfair API and offers live streaming.

At £59.95 per month, it doesn’t come cheap but it’s still a worthwhile investment when considering all it has to offer.

One word of warning, though: you will need a computer with at least a 2Gig processor and 512Mb of memory, although the vendor recommends a 3Gig processor and 1Gig of memory with a 19-inch monitor and 1280x1024 pixel resolution.

So, is a trading application worth having?

Yes, in my opinion. But obviously you must remember that it won’t turn a losing punter into a winning punter. Your present strategies need to be good ones. What it will do, though, is speed up your betting significantly.

However, one thing a trading application can never do is place bets for you without ever having to be sat in front of the computer, which is exactly what bots do.

A bot (short for robot) is a program that can back or lay bets, just as any human punter can. Unlike a regular punter, though, it doesn’t need to eat, drink or sleep, and it can request a web page several times a second.

These mechanisms are generally of a more personal nature, tailored by individual programmers to suit individual needs and, as such, they’re not as readily available to the consumer as trading applications.

Bots tend to be a hot topic on the Betfair forums, with as many critics as there are admirers as to what they achieve. Without the human element, bots can go wrong and one worrying case of a bot going wrong recently sparked a heated thread on the Betfair forum.

The thread, entitled ‘Ring-fenced funds are under attack by bots’ was introduced by Hazel and revealed a flaw in how a particular bot operated in markets when a horse is later withdrawn.

Apparently, if a doubtful runner is entered into a race Betfair gives it a zero per cent reduction factor. As a result, someone laying the field to 101 per cent with a bot could suddenly find themselves facing a loss if the horse is then withdrawn.

Hazel started the thread in order to draw attention to the fact that a poorly-written bot laying the field repeatedly when unattended throughout the night could have its owner looking at a massive liability of thousands of pounds, even though their bank is, say, £200.

This is because when you lay the field at 101 per cent and your bets are matched, your funds are still available to do the same over and over again. So if a horse with a zero per cent reduction factor is then withdrawn, the one per cent profit you had, on the assumption of it being a runner, suddenly becomes a loss.

As Hazel says: “At Newton Abbot (and not for the first time), one of the horses was a known non-runner (doubtful runner), so Betfair set its reduction factor to 0%. So when the non runner was taken out, instead of making a lot of 1% profits, the bot, with a mere £200 in his account lost £40,000. It was reported that the bot owner shit himself and Betfair wrote off the debt.”

The greatest concern Hazel had was that, if Betfair decided not to write off the debt, would the shortfall then be taken out of clients ring-fenced funds? Furthermore, there was also the possibility of unscrupulous punters taking advantage of the flaw by positioning themselves on both sides of the bet.

However, most people agreed such concerns were unlikely to happen, as Betfair would take steps to rectify the situation if it became too serious.

The episode reminded me of something similar happening on the cricket a few months back when it was claimed that a ‘top run scorer’ market was available to lay at more than 100 per cent.

One particular forumite took advantage and thanked the guy for bringing it to his attention. However, it soon became apparent that one of the players was actually a non-runner and the guys’ potential profit had suddenly turned into a massive loss, which he simply didn’t have in his account. 

Still, as far as the horse racing goes, it seems Betfair have now moved to solve a big part of the problem by removing possible non-runners from the overnight markets.