Punt.com - A Blog About Gambling by a Professional Gambler.

Roddick v Pong.

The only time a Roddick drop shot wins a match.

Do you advocate gambling?

Being a gambling blog, and one written by someone who has profited from it for 5 years, it would be easy to think that Punt.com would be fully in favour of everyone gambling.  Some would misconstrue the site as glamourizing gambling, even without reading the blog entries.  Many would be quick to label it irresponsible.

The internet (and real life) has an abundance of people who have endured awful problems because of gambling.  You only have to do a search on gambling problems to come across the numerous forums full of people in crippling debt.

I don't advocate people gambling. 

Firstly let me say that this blog is and always has been intended as a notepad for my own thoughts on gambling, and a place where a community of gamblers, traders and those curious can come to read about or comment on the finer points of what we do.  It is intentionally complicated at times, it deals with some fairly deep psychological ideas... These are issues professional gamblers deal with on a day to day basis and if anything, should describe the level of expertise required to make this pay.

During the time I've been writing this blog, I've referred a few friends to have a read.  These are people that knew I gambled, but did not know the sorts of things I had to contend with.  Their response has been the same each time - we had no idea it was such hard work, we thought you were a "lay about!"  (Or words to that effect.)  They thought I just watched sport and picked winners.  Nothing is further from the truth.

What this is demonstrating is their lack of understanding of gambling.  It's the same lack of knowledge that the general public suffers from, and one of a few reasons why we have problem gambling.

Clearly gambling is something I take very seriously, it's my job and my money on the line.  But for the vast majority of people, gambling should be about light entertainment, with money they can afford to lose (spend), on something they enjoy watching.  They aren't particularly worried about obtaining the knowledge needed to profit. Firstly because they don't really know it exists, secondly they think it's just a case of picking winners and lastly, they'd rather spend their time enjoying having a punt.

Not being qualified in psychology, I can't offer an expert view on the mechanics of gambling.  But it's clear to me that there is something a little paradoxical going on when we mix money, games of chance and entertainment.  Humans, it seems, struggle to deal with this in some basic way.  Quote from wikipedia on gambling,  "though many participate in gambling as a form of recreation or even as a means to gain an income, gambling, like any behavior which involves variation in brain chemistry, can become a psychologically addictive and harmful behavior in some people. Reinforcement phenomena may also make gamblers persist in gambling even after repeated losses."

Prior to striking a bet, the door to problem gambling wasn't open - and this is the way I believe it should be for most people.  Even when they set out with the best of intentions to enjoy themselves, many will end up being hooked.

It's my opinion that people need to be armed with much more knowledge and understanding of gambling in general.  It seems like there's a carefully nurtured void in our collective knowledge of the subject, perhaps those that profit from the addicted gamblers have done their best to surpress this. 

When I was younger, my parents taught me about the dangers of gambling.  It was not something they ever wanted to see me doing - a member of my family had had problems in the past, and they didn't want to see me go down the same path.  It made me weary of gambling, and it made me want to understand why they developed a problem and to never develop one myself. 

And yet here I am doing it as a job!  Perhaps that is why it is my job.  When I began gambling I was paranoid about the prospect of developing a problem.  It was a bit scary, I made sure I never chased losses and I made equally sure that I never got the buzz of adrenaline from it.  Gamblers out there are probably thinking - where's the fun in that ?! 

Knowledge is power.

If you aren't a gambler but want to gamble, then I'm not going to stop you.  I always tell people to not gamble if they haven't started and to stop if they have.  Particularly when they don't appear to be very clued up.  Before anyone gambles for entertainment or otherwise they need to know a few things:

• Why bookmakers make a profit.
• Why casinos make a profit.
• Gambling causes problems for people, it can be dangerous to do, even for those with the best of intentions.
• This is a mathematical game, if you know points one and two then you will also know the chances of you making a profit is close to zero!
• The chances of you losing your money is therefore close to 100%.
• If you are doing it for entertainment then spend time figuring out how you will feel once you have lost.  Because quite simply, you will - make sure you are ok with that and make sure you won't want to make it back.
• Never bet more money than you can afford to lose.
• Probability, probability, probability.  You can't beat it.  The gambler's fallacy.  Don't know about probability ? - Give up now.
• Never use gambling as an escape from real life problems.  Some gambling games hypnotically affect people, they are designed to suck you in and make you forget reality.  Never forget the bigger picture, know how much money you are betting.
• Some casinos pump oxygen round to keep the gambler's going for longer, slot machines make trance like patterns with their lights.  Don't you think this is more than a little out of order?
• It is in bookmakers best interests to glamourise gambling.  To make you think you can win and to push bad strategies subconcsiously onto you.  Hardly surprising is it?
• People selling systems are almost guaranteed to be losers.  Why would you sell a system when the rewards for using it would be so much higher.  Also, a sold system becomes worthless because so many people use it and the bookmakers / markets change because of it - system no longer works.

If you think you are suffering from problem gambling then there are some links at the bottom of the page.  Please do the right thing and follow them.  Gambling is a dangerous sport, please be aware of the warnings that come attached to it, never let your guard down and always count the amount of money you are gambling and think what you might be spending that on instead.  For the regular gamblers here, I make few apologies if this entry seems too preachy.  It sometimes pains me how some knowledge that we take for granted, ends up causing so much greif, and on top of that - very few are telling people about it. 

Gamcare

Gamblers Anonymous International, Gamblers Anonymous UK 

#3

"The foolish reject what they see;

the wise reject what they think."

- Zen saying.

I particularly love this one.  Perfect for trading.

An easy indicator of poor focus.

Simple one this is, and most will take it for granted.  In my experience, as soon as I begin to cheer someone on, followed by getting angry that they didn't take their chance or win this point or that point, then I know I'm out of the zone.

The zone is effortless, opinionless and frictionless.  All of these begin to change just before I exit it and start urging someone on.  Awareness closes down and therefore the right things to be doing don't get taken care of, and I'm forced into conciously thinking about what to do next.  I've been jolted out of the flow of things.

Keep an eye on the temptation to guess and hope that someone will win for you.  Guessing and hoping are things you definitely want to avoid yourself and look for in your opponents.

How much do you make? (and other related financial questions.)

It's a policy of the blog never to publish the figures I am betting.  There are one or two clues dotted around which might indicate roughly the amounts I bet.

Just as I don't like telling people in real life the amounts I am winning and losing, I won't be doing so here.  Very few people apart from close family and friends know the figures and this is how it will be staying, it affects relationships and friendships - most of whom know my job, but understand that amounts aren't really to be asked about.  I know I'm not the only blogger to not publish figures, these are very good reasons for not doing so.

When I began the blog I had discussions with one or two other gambling bloggers about this and their views were mixed, both sides had good points.  Those that said there's no need to publish them, understood my reasons.  Those that said it's not good enough to post opinions and detailed posts without proving it through figures, I disagreed with, but respected their opinion.  My hope is to continue posting good quality articles and disprove the neccessity to post the numbers. 

If you can't get by without knowing how much I'm winning or losing then this blog is not for you.

Self destruct mode.

You've had a terrible day.  It feels like the World has been against you the whole day, right from when you got up to when you just finished trading.  And what about the trading, how did that go?  Terribly.  You got off to the worst start possible, you jumped in quickly, you were impatient, impulsive and angry.  You were full of opinion and your losses kept mounting as time went on thanks to some particularly bad luck. 

But then you did something really stupid, you decided to put the icing on the cake, something fatalistic and dramatic just to finish things off nicely - a risk it all, fight to the death last throw of the dice.

Forget the first paragraph.  Sometimes you just have bad days - get used to it, you are human and life throws up some bad luck every now and then.  The real damage is done in the last part.

It's probably safe to assume most of us have felt the temptation to do this at some point and maybe done it too.  It's a "may as well" attitude...  I've had a crap day, I "may as well" dump the lot.

Trading, Gambling and Poker is about staying at the table, the long journey.  You can't give the whole thing up on a bad day, and there's never any excuse for "may as well"s.  When it comes round to learning from the experience you will be mad with yourself for surrendering like this.

Trace the whole episode back to the beginning.  You were having a bad day and maybe underprepared yourself, things began to go against you, but instead of maintaining awareness of what was happening you began to feel attacked personally.   

You need to maintain a detachment from the situation so that you can keep your head, no matter how tempting it is to turn yourself into a victim of circumstance.  Don't give in to self pity, take responsibility for what you do.

If you are having a bad day, find something else to do, there's always tomorrow.

The legendary, Borg v Mac Wimbledon 1980 4th Set TB.

In full !  Big hair and sweat bands at their very best. :)

#2

"Get the facts,

or the facts will get you."

- Thomas Fuller.

Negative thoughts.

I used to be a fairly handy golfer.  It was my profession before this.  You might be surprised how much golf and sports psychology crosses over into trading and gambling.  Determination, confidence, over-confience, fear.. self esteem.  There's plenty of material to be going on with.  This post is about the power of negative thoughts though.

When I used to teach golf, one of the most important psychological parts of the game is the pre-shot routine.  A short period of time spent by the player before each shot, going through the same physical and mental routine every time.  To the amateur this always looked like a waste of time, why bother actually standing behind the ball picturing actively where you want it to go ?  Answer - because it beats thinking about where you don't want it to go.

We had a saying - thinking about where you dont want to hit the ball, will almost certainly result in you hitting it there.  Thinking about where you do want the ball to go, allows it to happen.

Look at how powerful those negative thoughts are.  They almost guarantee a bad result, where  positive thinking only allows something to happen.  The same holds true in most walks of life.  I'm definitely not qualified to give any scientific thoughts on why, though I intend to hit amazon for some books on quantum fields and how consciousness affects things very soon.  A more down to earth reason might be that negative thoughts can lead to tension of muscles and of thought.  A loss of confidence in yourself and thus the results you feared appear before you.

I've lost track of the number of times I've begun my day feeling good about life and the trading day ahead and gone on to produce brilliant results.  The opposite is also true for when I'm feeling bad.  I have to feel the probability of doing well is against me somehow when I'm not feeling good about trading.  Question is how do we stop the negative thoughts ?

I'm no guru, so what you are going to get is from my own personal experience.  And perhaps I should take my own advice on this more, because it always seems to work for me.  I've mentioned in the past I like to head out for a walk or some exercise before trading... It's not just about staying fit, it's about collecting my thoughts and working on feeling calm and positive about the day ahead. 

I think as clearly as I can about how I want to trade, how calm I'm going to be yet how instinctual my trading is at the same time.  How patient I'm going to stay through the entire session and how simple following my plan is.  As much as possible I try to carry these thoughts with me through to the start of work. 

It's visualising exactly how you want to be and do things, and it makes a difference.  It re-enforces good positive thinking, it becomes habitual.  Just as visualising a golf swing strengthens muscle memory, the same occurs for any action... including trading and gambling oddly enough.   

How long have you gambled for? How long have you been a full time gambler?

I opened my betfair account on Sep12th 2001.  Before that I had an account at flutter.com for a couple of months before they were bought out by Betfair.  I became a full time gambler in June/July 2003 and have been ever since.

This is the only time I will ever mention figures on the blog in relation to my betting anyway.  I began with £150 and gambled it away on a very silly horse racing system which had absolutely no chance of winning in the long run.  I spent the next month or two not betting but figuring out why it failed and how the new betting exchanges worked.  I began again on 31st December 2001 with £75, my sole intention being to make back the £150 I had lost, to prove I could do it. 

Somehow during this period I had stumbled across a few forum postings about the similarity of the betting exchange model to the financial markets and decided to investigate.  I bought some basic financial trading books, one of which was "Reminiscences of a stock operator" (link on left side of blog).  I found this book to be inspirational and I wanted to try to trade Betfair in as similar way as I could to the stock market.  Looking back on it - I was introducing as much skill to the equation as I could.

Fast forward 5 years and here we are, my £75 having grown by a large percentage since.  Certainly, any financial trader would be rather pleased with the return I've been able to make.  Figures to be publish in a book I may or may not write in the year 2015 ;).