Greyhounds Automated Pre-off Trading

[kiint]

I sort of have this view that being able to create a bot that can trade the dogs pre-off and consistently make a profit as a bit of a holy grail of automated trading.
I've been looking at these races recently and tweaking my horse bot to see if it makes a profit on them.
Well, it does sometimes, other times it doesn't. This of course is to be expected but I do find that it is very unpredictable and I struggle to see any patterns from it.
Like now, I have it running and so far out of six races I have four profitable ones for a net profit of an amazing 67p. However, I'm pretty confident, that this may continue for a few more races before each race starts to return a loss. (Which is one pattern that continues to puzzle me).
Oh, well, I'll keep tweaking and trying.

Does anyone manage to automate pre-race dogs successfully?

[Captain Sensible]

Yep, the dogs does seem like the holy grail for automation but unfortunately I found there's just far too little liquidity to make trading a reliable option for botting. I make a few quid from automating things but it's far too little to get excited about but like any botting strategy if the computers on it'd be silly not to pick up the beer money.

[kiint]

I agree Cap'n, as you say, if it can be done, it'd be silly not to take advantage of it.
Personally, I'd be happy with an average of very small profits per race as with the huge number of races going off compared with the horses, it can build up quite quickly.
But, it's a bit beyond me at the moment as I haven't been able to fathom what races I should get involved with and which should be ignored. I have a feeling there are a number of factors involved and I think I need some more research before committing to anything running autonomously.

Cheers,
Kiint

[Dai_Young]

The number of races does make greyhound racing seem like an attractive trading medium. However the vast majority of money is bet with less than a couple of minutes to the off. I'm not really a trader by nature but I would have thought this makes trading very difficult - you need to be in and out so quickly.

I'd also add that liquidity on dog markets has taken a nosedive in the past few months. I'm a layer/backer in the side markets (F/C, Placed) and the money in those markets is extremely sparse on all apart from the televised racing on Thurs, Fri, Sat evenings.

[kiint]

I agree Dai, which is why I think one off the critical things is determining the ideal point at which to enter the market.

The other problem is that I believe there are a lot of sharks swimming in that particular pond and they very good at what they do. So the other thing is to try to avoid being caught in the traps they lay and to also not come to their attention and getting gobbled up.

[U.F.O]

Another issue is being caught with a open trade.
you obviously have to trade very late on with the dogs,
the clock is often into minus numbers before even a single penny is matched.
So therefore it's very very easy to get caught with a open position unless you have live pictures.

With a bot things get even more difficult, you obviously have take SP as an option, but even that's not a perfect solution.

[alrodopial]

The other problem is that I believe there are a lot of sharks swimming in that particular pond and they very good at what they do. So the other thing is to try to avoid being caught in the traps they lay and to also not come to their attention and getting gobbled up.

Indefinite statement.
Can you be more specific?

[kiint]

Another issue is being caught with a open trade.
you obviously have to trade very late on with the dogs,
the clock is often into minus numbers before even a single penny is matched.
So therefore it's very very easy to get caught with a open position unless you have live pictures.

With a bot things get even more difficult, you obviously have take SP as an option, but even that's not a perfect solution.

True, luckily though, unlike the US horses, you can be pretty sure that the market will suspend more or less on the off time and so long as things are going okay, it won't be much after the scheduled off time. I've noticed some do suspend early, but it tends to only be a few seconds. This does give you the option of setting a specific pre-off point at which to close your trades. Unfortunately, by the nature of the markets, this has to be very close to the off time and so you only get a very small window to get your closing bets matched.

So, I agree that it is easy to be caught with open positions but I do think it is manageable.

[kiint]

The other problem is that I believe there are a lot of sharks swimming in that particular pond and they very good at what they do. So the other thing is to try to avoid being caught in the traps they lay and to also not come to their attention and getting gobbled up.

Indefinite statement.
Can you be more specific?

What I think is that due to the low liquidity in those markets, there are ample opportunities for people with large banks to manipulate the price to a point they like. Drawing the bots to follow them before taking the money and letting the price spring back to where it should be.

Of course, it could also be people that know the true value of a dog, that sits there letting the various bots place back bets, leapfrogging each other until the price gets nice and low and then taking all the money with a large lay that takes the price back to where it should be.

Whatever happens, there are some very experienced people that know how to recognise inexperienced traders and bots and also know how to take advantage of them.

So, all in all, difficult markets to automate successfully, but not, I think, impossible.

[U.F.O]

True, luckily though, unlike the US horses, you can be pretty sure that the market will suspend more or less on the off time and so long as things are going okay, it won't be much after the scheduled off time.

So, I agree that it is easy to be caught with open positions but I do think it is manageable.

The US horses operate on MTP system so that's why the off times are often way out.

But still the dogs schedule does get quite messed up at times, i woudn't be at all confident that they nearly all go off on time.
From experience it almost impossible not to get caught out without using pictures. Even if you use the take SP option there will be times where you get the dreaded suspend coming up before the bets are placed.

The only guaranteed way of not being exposed of cause is to stop the bot trading with clock at 0.00,
but then often nothing happens till past that point anyway,
so alot of races you wouldn't be able to trade.

Ive manged to automate most of my strategies, but would be stumped by the dogs, but good luck anyway

[alrodopial]

The US horses operate on MTP system so that's why the off times are often way out.

What is the MTP system?

[doris_day]

Minutes To Post

[Captain Sensible]

I just scrape the MTP times from sites like https://classic.ebetusa.com/racing_menus/next-race.html then use the race numbers to match with the corresponding marketID's in my bots. Not perfect but is good enough for what my bots do.

[alrodopial]

I just scrape the MTP times from sites like https://classic.ebetusa.com/racing_menus/next-race.html then use the race numbers to match with the corresponding marketID's in my bots. Not perfect but is good enough for what my bots do.

Are these MTP times more accurate than the scheduled off times provided by bf ?
Captain can you post some examples/differences from yesterdays races?

[kiint]

I just scrape the MTP times from sites like https://classic.ebetusa.com/racing_menus/next-race.html then use the race numbers to match with the corresponding marketID's in my bots. Not perfect but is good enough for what my bots do.

Are these MTP times more accurate than the scheduled off times provided by bf ?
Captain can you post some examples/differences from yesterdays races?

Very much so.
I have no examples but the US horse races seem to go off when they want to and it can be before or after the published Betfair offtime.
The best thing to do is to go by the MTP times that you get on websites such as EBetUSA that the Cap'n gives above.