Why such poor market depth on every sport betfair?

Many people have had enough of Betfair's high charges and poor website so either bet elsewhere or spend their money on non betting activities.

High charges caused people to leave, which caused less liquidity, which caused more people to leave, then the sportsbook came along and took many of the casual punters, which reduced liquidity, which caused more people to leave, and so on...

Those who have stayed behind are forced to concentrate on the markets where liquidity is good and so those markets have probably seen an increase in liquidity.

however liquidity has gone up, not down...kind of important

so .....basically everything said here is moot

As TP has pointed out, if you want to get decent bets on in main markets, you probably now have a better chance of getting matched without moving the market than previously before, but if you want to get a bet - even a smallish one - on a side market, you are essentially screwed. 

That is not a good thing.

Aug 18, 2015 -- 2:15AM, fixed wrote:

however liquidity has gone up, not down...kind of importantso .....basically everything said here is moot

Depends how you define liquidity. I would say liquidity is in sharp decline but there is still some very key focus on a very narrow band of markets.

total traded volume pretty much the only liquidity measure available that is backed up by data, so it has to be starting point and carry a lot of weight of course


however it sure is much more convenient to go by feel and declare some random secondary market dead...can't be falsified, will be applauded.... win win, for losers

Liquidity is the amount of bets offered at any point in time (or more practically the average thereof over some period). Trading volume is the amount of bets taken over some period.

Liquidity can go down, while volume goes up. And as stated, Total volume tells us nothing about liquidity in various markets and sports.

My anecdotal observation in the cricket markets is liquidity has indeed gone down, while volume has increased.

And if the volume of bets offered over some time period remains the same, and volume increases, liquidity will indeed decrease.

The plethora of empty boxes, the frequent display of trap bet prices is informing me that liquidity is non existent.

Betfair Exchange now is simply a few Bots struggling to get a bite as people bet elsewhere now or spend their money on other activities.

Aug 19, 2015 -- 7:04AM, pxb wrote:

Liquidity is the amount of bets offered at any point in time (or more practically the average thereof over some period). Trading volume is the amount of bets taken over some period.Liquidity can go down, while volume goes up. And as stated, Total volume tells us nothing about liquidity in various markets and sports.My anecdotal observation in the cricket markets is liquidity has indeed gone down, while volume has increased.

100% agree. You can't measure liquidity for volume because it can often tell you nothing about how the bets are being traded and matched.

*by

there you go..."anectdotal observations" fueled by frustation and amplified by feedback from other market-share losers


and so you refuse to look at the hard trading data (volume) and instead make up something as soft as possible ("the amount of bets offered at any point in time") while at the same time destroying your very own argument by contantly complaining that most of those bid/asks are just phantom offers by those bad bots (as opposed to your 'good' trading activity) that disappear the moment one wants to hit it


you are losing and it is of course somebody else's fault.... that's all there is to it

Fixed you are so patronising to others on this thread. There are plenty of winners on Betfair who will tell you that outside of the main markets on any sport the liquidity has fallen off a cliff. It is not always possible to use/access definitive metrics to show this. If you play in these markets on a daily basis though you know what is happening.

Volume matched is a very poor measure of liquidity but if you wish to use that one. Tell me how markets such as the following are doing with regard to volume;

Golf - 2/3 Balls, 1st rd Leader, Matchbets
Tennis - Game by Game, Set Winners, Hcaps
Cricket - Top Batsman mkts
Darts - Leg by leg, hcaps

I have no doubt that the figures will have been growing massively just because the main markets are seeing higher volumes matched...

The figures will be lower than five years ago....

My anecdotal observation is that liquidity (not in terms of offer size but in terms of practically getting money on) is steady to marginally improving over the last couple of years.  (and I'm not talking main sports)

It's not what it was in it's heyday at all but I don't feel it's still getting worse, which is what I expected would happen.

I don't tend to notice liquidity on the big markets because you can always get matched. 

Offers will always get smaller in size the harder it is to profit from those offers.  Nothing can ever get done about that except from banning winning clients.

Fixed, I'm not losing.  In fact, I've won more YTD than at same stage last year.  Yet it's clear to me a whole swathe of markets are seeing less matched and fewer active customers.  As you bizarrely ignore anything that's not fact, how about this passage from an email I received from Betfair just last week with regards some markets that have been around for years:

After a recent analysis of markets on the exchange, some markets will no longer be offered due to their poor performance. These include the markets mentioned.

Aug 18, 2015 -- 2:15AM, fixed wrote:

however liquidity has gone up, not down...kind of importantso .....basically everything said here is moot

Hahahaha :) -

ignore @fixed

yeah- liquidity is up  but only on the main markets and also main markets within a market .

e.g Correct score may be well up on any current scoreline in play but longer scorelines are not getting many bites at all compared with last season,some scorelines  simply don't get matched  .

there you go..."anectdotal observations" fueled by frustation and amplified by feedback from other market-share losers


and so you refuse to look at the hard trading data (volume) and instead make up something as soft as possible ("the amount of bets offered at any point in time") while at the same time destroying your very own argument by contantly complaining that most of those bid/asks are just phantom offers by those bad bots (as opposed to your 'good' trading activity) that disappear the moment one wants to hit it


you are losing and it is of course somebody else's fault.... that's all there is to it

Too much denial and ad hominems to bother replying to this.

Although I'll note the reason I notice declining liquidity is I substantially benefit from it as a liquidity provider.

you can not not reply by replying. shows you are weak and feel the need to defend yourself 3583 times...and that ridiculous latin cc only makes it worse


one more note to the total number of markets: it has gone up A LOT as well over time, probably doubled or tripled compared to 10y ago.....however the only thing you guys will keep noticing is if some of them are removed

How can liquidity NOT go down when they've pulled out of so many jurisdictions. Since Mark Davies left you never hear of any attempts to get back in or enter new countries, either.

could the higher amounts simply be BFs very own volumes laying off sportsbook wagers ?

Or seeding their own exchange. With increasing commissions after profit sums(exchange) may be very close to the sportsbook odds.

The PC will be the main reason for declining liquidity in secondary markets, because that is where PC payers made most of their money.

@TheFear

Re-entering markets like this maybe (from today's IMS announcement).

"In Portugal, we are applying for an operating licence under recently proposed legislation and, as requested by the regulator, have switched off our site whilst licensing is concluded. "