Having self belief

belief

 

–noun

1.

something believed;  an opinion or conviction: a belief thatthe earth is flat.

2.

confidence in the truth or existence of something notimmediately susceptible to rigorous proof: a statementunworthy of belief.

3.

confidence; faith; trust: a child's belief in his parents.

4.

a religious tenet or tenets; religious creed or faith: theChristian belief.

I feel like this is some kind of acceptance at the Oscars or similar, because if someone had told me that I could go from be a newbie trader with a little knowledge to go to make over £330 in one month I would have thought they was crazy, but that is exactly what I have done, simply sticking to the plan and taking little bites of the cherry soon add up, a word to the beginners out there- keep the faith and keep going and stick to the plan- you can do it.

Just not cricket

Having made about 1% of my bank on the previous test match between England and India I decided to continue where I left off, I layed India at the start of the game and greened up by just after my lunch for about £6 any outcome, I thought brilliant India just haven't got it in them them and put in a cheeky £4 lay to green up when the odds doubled up to about 8-9s, never happened cos England have collapsed and having backed and layed over £2700 I am left with £1.54 on any result, you must admit that that just takes the piss, I should have stayed with my green of £6 and left it at that until it rolled into my bank on Tuesday when it finished. Oh well that's greed for you.

Back on to the horse racing, I just want to try and explain something that is making me shift my approach to trading opportunities, when we all star out in the beginning our stakes are small and don't affect the market, but now that my stakes are increasing, when I find a gap in the market say nothing at 6.8 and same at 7.0 if I put my £25 in in its looks a lot bigger in the market and find people either going in front of it or when it does get matched it creates a negative pressure and send the market the opposite way to where my tick offset is and have to scratch/take a loss/ be more selective and try to scalp the market when I can see direction or when its nicely built up nearer to the start of the race.

Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds - The Death Of You And Me

The Stone Roses - I am the Resurrection (audio only)

Public service announcement

I have just received the following message as a comment on this blog, I have posted it as obviously it is a scam and I wanted to warn anyone against contacting this person if they have been sent anything similar, I have blurred out the email address for security reasons-




'Hello, i am betfair full-time trader since 4 years and since short time i started to trade for customers with a ROI of 35% per month on average. If you are interested to join me or share trading views dont hesitate add me in msn **************@hotmail.fr or mail me in that adress. I am at present developing an application for Smartphone to bet on tennis matches In Play since the stands of a stage(stadium), taking advantage to see the point marked directly(live) with regard to the traders who have to wait for the TV flow or the stake has in the daytime of the scoreboard on internet (delays of several seconds.) This kind of trading is called of the courtside trading. good luck'


Also the email is from France and isn't betfair banned there? So even suspect if you ask me.

Why trading is like a game of Snakes and Ladders

I say snakes and ladders metaphorically, its not a new game that betfair are offering, I find that when you start out the gains and losses are really big compared to your bank size as you find yourself being ill-disciplined and going inplay making good gains related to your bank and also taking big losses that will wipe out your beginners bank. As we progress through our trading journey the ladders(wins) become more relative to our bank size and snakes(loses) become easier to absorb into our trading life, expect, except that is when we deviate from the trading plan and don't do what is says on the tin and we find ourselves going down a bigger snake than we wanted to, basically I went inplay after doing so well for so long and lost over 1/3 of my bank or £112 on a horse and being stupid, careless, call it what you will. It links in so well my previous post where I said its a fine line between being over confident and complacent, at the time I know I should be taking the loss and accepting it, but I never and I will deal with the setback and carry on going forward.

Today is the Eve of the betfair trading bank robbery(PC increase to 60%) seriously its a joke, traders making a modest amount will have the earning capped and probably feeling like they are doing this for nothing, I hope they find a way to continue trading either through better competition in the exchanges, I see a few new ones popping up and maybe they will become something of a serious competitor to betfair, I know this wont happen in a hurry and I feel that the £250k limit will come down to meet me before I get to that level, so even though I have only just started profiting from this game, long may it continue on betfair or elsewhere

Significant figures

My betfair bank is now at a level where I cannot just re-deposit some extra cash to top it up, if I lost my mind one day and decided upon gambling it away in play then I would be F!"£$D big style as it would be a long way back. But on the opposite side it is also at the level where I can consistently pull in at least £1 per race sometimes up to £3 and this is where I get the title from as I truly believe, that like all newbies want a substantial enough bank to make it feel like its worth while trading. It just took me a very long time to realise this and I can call on quite a few well known traders out there to use a few quotes-

Tradeshark "The best way to grow your bank is to grow it slowly"

The Badger "Increase your bank by 3% per day and you'll double it in less than month"

There are probably a lot more that I have read from around the forums, other blogs and videos from youtube.

I know trading isn't easy, as each and every race is different and brings its own challenges, I am beginning to 'learn' how to face and over come these obstacles, e.g don't get involved in an Irish with 10 mins left not you'll end up on the wrong side of big swing. I know for sure that with confidence comes complacency and it feels like a fine line between them both sometimes, but I sure as hell can't wait for the start of the new football season and seriously wish I had started learning about cricket a bit earlier, but still good advice from the daily trader email from centaur last week and also over last weekend- spot on with trades.

Think I am going to leave it there as its getting late and got to get up for my 'normal' job in the morning.

Only a film premier

Last I was invited to a premier of a film, which my wife had worked on(well done Susie) it was a small budget film but no the less it was really good I really enjoyed it and the after show, which was a get together on salford quays. The film is Desperate Measures and I hope you can get chance to have look at it.

Still got to go out after all that

Been sat here for the last few hours trading, feeling rough from last night and I now feel absolutely shattered after keep my attention for so long, but that is my only complaint as I have made a good profit on the horse racing this afternoon, my thoughts of trading on a Saturday have changed recently, as I now appreciate that I can scalp a race every five minutes and turn out a good green book. A side from that I have a 2% of bank profit on either result in the Eng v Sri Lanka, my only let down today was a loss in a football match trying to trade the u2.5- starting odds 1.75 so I backed it with a view to lay off at 1.1ish and the lowest it ever got was around the 1.40 mark and the game ended with 4 goals being scored, still I am only using minimum stakes for the time being.

My focussed has altered a bit, a lot I should say as I think finally I can see in my mind that rather than goes inplay to make 50p and risk £40 to it, its easier to red up for a loss and move onto the next race, I know I could be making more per race but for the time being I am happy with £1 a race average over the last few weeks, I have got my betfair bank up to the highest its ever been, so like I said I am a bit more eager to protect it and not do silly things to risk it, clearly I have not 'made it' yet as a sports trader but instead of comparing myself to anyone else I am content with the growth I have achieved both mentally and in terms of my Betfair balance. Patience is the key, along with discipline and more patience and more discipline, so try and keep at it if you've just started out.

Keeping the ball rolling

Really enjoyed today, I have traded nearly every horse race this evening and profited in most took a few reds in the remainder, my trading today started early as I got involved in the cricket whilst I was still at work and made a return of 50% on my stake courtesy of the daily trader email, I have got money on the argies game later backing the O2.5 and have put in a lay bet using the keep bet function, I'll either make a bit or lose a bit  but I'm not staying up that late to follow it, but I'm pretty sure it'll be the first thing I check in the morning. Night all

So lets kick off day one

I had two trades advised to me today from the trader club, one horse trade (no profit) and the other was a lay of Murray, I didn't use the stakes advised, as obviously my bank doesn't match that of the Badgers, anyway the lay of Murray resulted in a tidy profit overall considering the stakes I had used, I did the Murray trade when I was at my PC today and monitored it once I had come out of the swimming pool- betfair mobile even shows the scores these days. Over the coming week and months Centaur has a number of different trading courses and seminars running both online and in person, I know one days sun doesn't make a harvest but I think they have lots of good info and tuition on offer. The trader club I have signed up for is less than £1 per day and just being a monthly subscriber entitles you to an 80% discount on a courses you decided to undertake, take look here