What are similarities between trading and gambling?

You don't have to be an expert trader to critique casino games. I played a lot of blackjack during the early 1990s. I would estimate that I am more knowledgeable about blackjack than I am about the currency markets.

I Googled "NOR baccarat strategy", and the first link was to a PDF (attached), which I read. It talked about how to recognize "chop", "streak" and "neutral" shoes. The key is whether any of this gives you info as to what the card distribution remaining in the shoe is. In other words, info about the probable future, which is where any possible edge lies, rather than the past. If so, there may be some validity in it. Otherwise, it's just another variation of gambler's fallacy, in which case the betting and MM strategies that they propose will be worthless.

Dr Mike Shackleford (the 'Wizard of Odds') is a widely respected, and unbiased, expert on casino games and math. He says "Every baccarat table will have plenty of score cards and pencils for the players to keep track of the outcome of every hand. Most players will do so religiously and carefully analyze their card for trends as the winning hand switches back and forth from the banker to the player. This is a big waste of time! The smart player will bet on the banker every time and leave the score cards alone." (source) This is in complete contrast to what NOR is recommending, and tells me that NOR is probably a sham.

I also experimented with the Wizard's baccarat calculator (here). I tested a few different combos of cards remaining, and I wasn't able to find a combo that gave the punter positive expectancy. While the only way to win at blackjack is to count cards, I note that here he reaches the conclusion that "for all practical purposes baccarat is not a countable game."

Over time, casinos make millions, thanks to their small house edge. The MIT blackjack team demonstrated that all you need to do is turn a negative 1%-2% edge into a positive 1%-2% edge to reverse that, which is enough to take a huge amount from casinos, exactly what they achieved. In the NOR baccarat PDF, it says that the authors (Clifton Davis and Keith Smith) have collectively 60 years of baccarat experience, which -- if their system has even a small edge -- is plenty of time for them to have accumulated several million dollars. If they're multi-millionaires, then why are they selling membership to NOR for $600? (as stated in the PDF). That's a big red flag to me.
(The PDF also contains pictures of the 'Mr Monopoly' man, and from the James Bond movie Thunderball -- none of which is really significant, it looks like cheap promotional hype to me).

Anyway, I'm not willing to pay $600 to find out whether the NOR system works or not. I smell a rat. And I'm not aware of anybody who's made the news by making a career fortune from playing baccarat. This also suggests to me that the game can't be beaten in the longer term.

There are hundreds of vendors selling "systems" to beat roulette, and (unless they're based on the physics causing the way in which the ball interacts with the roulette wheel, or the way in which a wheel might be biased) they're all scams. Given the simplicity and accessibility of casino games, there are probably more scammers selling dodgy roulette, baccarat, craps etc "systems" than there are hucksters selling dodgy forex "systems". All of these folk are preying on the greed, laziness and ignorance of gullible folk who are looking for an easy way to make some quick money. Either these scammers understand the math behind the game, in which case they're intentionally committing an act of premeditated fraud, or they don't, which means they're no more knowledgeable than the chumps that they're selling their worthless junk to. Caveat emptor!

The reasons are completely different. Back testing a trading system (using MT4's strategy tester, for example) generates inaccurate results primarily because it does not take into account the spread/swap/slippage that would have occurred at the time the trades were taken. Computer simulations of casino games are inaccurate only to the extent that the RNG being used does not generate a perfectly 'random' series of numbers. There are some very good RNGs nowadays, hence the simulations that they generate are accurate enough for most purposes.

Oh bae u can speak for me anyday.

Funny because I already have substantial success in trading including work as a trader in a very large group of hedge funds that had several BILLION under management. AND I have made a lot of money and lost as well trading my own capital. Just because I want to make some additional money on the weekends at tables... who the F cares. You act like it can't be possible because some professors say so? Why aren't all these smart guy professors taking their genius to the financial markets then? They should all be gajillionaires.

Jeff Bezos has an s load of money and he sells things for a loss all day every day so you tell me.

BTW, most at the table including us where playing Banker most of the time, but that we the heavy bias at our table. Of course a true simulator can work in all sorts of card bias, but is there one out there? That is how real cards play out.

Specifically on NOR Baccarat, in the video I posted they flat out say that there is no one system that can beat the game. They make that very clear. They are clearing using player experience and gut as an overlay to three different systems with a conservative betting approach.

Because they understand that just because a lot of muppets run around running their mouth about how it's possible to beat the house that this doesn't make it so. It takes a little thing called an edge.

It's like you've never considered the concept of luck, and how some are lucky. The smart move is not to bet your future on luck, but you don't have to be smart to make money. Just dumb and lucky.

You seem rather lucky.

VERY SMART:

Dr Mike Shackleford (the 'Wizard of Odds') is a widely respected, and unbiased, expert on casino games and math. He says "Every baccarat table will have plenty of score cards and pencils for the players to keep track of the outcome of every hand. Most players will do so religiously and carefully analyze their card for trends as the winning hand switches back and forth from the banker to the player. This is a big waste of time! The smart player will bet on the banker every time and leave the score cards alone." (source) This is in complete contrast to what NOR is recommending, and tells me that NOR is probably a sham.

This is rich because where I was there were no score cards or pencils available AND pretty much nobody I was around was taking any type of score on paper or their cell phone, etc. So your Dr. bro is the big expert because he did some edge math. When is the last time he actually played anything?

There are many who have chipped away at house edges and been very well rewarded

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rc...YVuMpNtNMFlMAQ

Even in straight player to player poker, one must be on the look out for all sorts. If the following can happen in a private game setting, I BET that some shady things go down in a casino setting as well.

You invited people to evaluate the NOR baccarat system. I did my best in the time that I had available, with the info that I could find.

I'm not trying to prove anything. If a person believes in the overruling validity of expectancy math, as I do, then there is nothing to prove, because the math speaks for itself.

Sure. As another example, there are plenty of folk who've beaten blackjack, to the point where casinos have taken countermeasures (e.g. increased number of decks, earlier shuffle points, improved 'eye in the sky' detection of card counting, etc). Card games can potentially be beaten because the composition of the shoe, and hence the odds, are always changing. If there are occasions where the odds favor the player, and he is able to place bigger bets when that is the case (or have his colleagues suddenly visit the table and bet big, when he signals them) without being detected by casino personnel, then sure, he will win.

But games where the odds are always constant, like craps and roulette, can't be beaten mathematically. You need to get inside the physics of the game (in roulette: the wheel/ball, in craps: the dice) to gain any kind of advantage.

Right. Craps and roulette have both been beaten btw, but only by manipulating the physics of the game -- not by manipulating the mathematics. Only an idiot would think you can bend the math. (No offense intended to the idiots participating in this thread)

My latest comment about The Wizard of Odd's review of baccarat is a comment on him.

Many of you have the position that the hundreds of thousands that game on any given day all lose over any substantial time frame and I don't. Your view is that the population is large enough to consistently send all losers to game - from casual to degenerate, but they all lose. Call it luck or player made edge, but there are people who do well gambling. As I stated earlier, the dragon doesn't have to eat everyone to be happy. Go review the financials of any gaming company and you might see that.

Many of you are also completely discounting the betting aspect and that a player could only deploy a consistent betting strategy.

Regarding craps and roulette, I have directly witnessed friends doing very well with it. Negative play only resulted from effectively going on tilt with a blood alcohol level that would probably be on the high end.

One of the best quotes Ive ever heard

Thanks numb ..

How many times has your math been bent in the financial markets? How about every day - all day. I thought common stock, for example, should reflect the present value of future earnings!

Take VRX. Most financial media stories I have reviewed from Bloomberg, etc. state that VRX never should have happened. The Wizard of Odds & Co. should have been shorting it throughout!

One should also consider the possibility that various elements of the gaming industry could put out all sorts of information about supposed this or supposed that related to gaming from posting on-line to systems, etc. Back to the NOR Baccarat System (of which I have no relationship personal, professional, financial, etc. or otherwise) they flat out state in one of their videos that casinos work to shuffle the decks/ shoes a certain way because that is most effective against most players. So it is possible to put out a lot of promotion for 'Approach ABC' and then set up a game so that it is very effective countering 'Approach ABC'.

From what I have seen of a few baccarat systems, I find it interesting that they play every round once they get going and are not stopped out. We didn't do that at all. Why would you do that? That is like trading and YOU MUST BE long or short a currency pair at all times. Maybe our spook/ inference/ luck overlay will be that good.

Hello everyone,
It truly bothers me when people compare "a casino game" to " forex". Reason being is because for most casino games, their isn't " a science" which can be implemented to tilt the odds in your favor. Take Roulette as an example, We all know wagering on a number pays 36:1 as you have a total of 38 numbers which can be hit. Their is no science which can be implemented which can cause you to take an educated guess as to what number would hit next. However, in forex, a constant is that Algo is used to determine prices of what it is you are trading. That is event based on the patterns which we see over and over again, no matter the TF you trade.
Al thought you have similarities between gambling and trading, simply trying to compare the two, to suggest that they are alike. would be like comparing place accidents to car accidents, you simply have way more cars, traveling then you have planes which SHOULD skew the probability of accidents, but it doesn't.
All in all, if traders, or someone was bold enough to study algo, and how to set up trades around them, then of course we would earn less pips daily, but we could increase the value of those pips, to in turn make constant profit. How many traders have held EU for 6 - 7 months only to now to turn profit, when the time wasted can never be recovered.

There are two types of person:
- person A that doesn't know what he is doing and makes money;
- person B that knows what he is doing and makes money.
This doesn't mean that person A is not gambling.
This doesn't mean that person B is not gambling.
It is not about knowing what you are doing that can save you from gambling, it is knowing what you are dealing with.
There are similarities between trading and gambling but they are far away from the nature of trading, they are a consequence of traders.
It sounds illogical but trading is gambling and it is not gambling, it's all up to the trader decide which side of the medal deal with.

Been there, done that. The only way betting systems can give you an edge is if you place higher bets on higher probability situations.

I've tested the following popular betting systems, each over different numbers of trials: martingale, anti-martingale, d'Alembert, Guetting, Labouchere, Oscar's Grind, Paroli, One Half Up, Parlay and 1-3-2-6 (the links are to some XLSs that I attached to posts). Assuming trials are independent (no serial correlation), and everything else being equal, then in themselves they all deliver a net expectancy of 0.

Staking systems can't improve expectancy: PipMeUp posted a neat mathematical proof here.

Forgive me, for I am a novice.

I think of forex more as a game of 2 player game, e.g. tennis, with more variables and variability.

For example, we know Djokovic usually wins. So, there is a higher chance if we bet on him. But, it's like betting on each shot/point if we do short term trading, which we usually do.

Now, imagine, instead of Djokovic we are talking Nishikori vs Murray. So, there's doubt either way. One will be stronger and will have lower odds. But at the same time, we won't know until the match is over that who won.

Imagine the game running in perpetuity and the score being calculated as the difference between when you start to bet on the match and then exit out of the match.

Happy to hear other views....

Regarding betting systems, I am speaking about spook/ inference/ luck overlay not something systematic AND being conservative. For example, if a game allows positioning counter to another player who is proving to be very unlucky/ doing poorly, then that could be factored or one could align with a player doing very well. Math, science, and systems would have a very difficult time modeling/ accounting for that.

Regarding pro tennis, I have seen grand slam matches were top players just give it away with a certain aspect of their game that they shouldn't. Even athletes of that caliber can have variance in how they do.

The odds given to you will reflect that, and in the long-run you will lose because at the end of the day the bookmaker only gives odds that end-up leaving him with money in the end. It's my understanding that there are rare times where the odds aren't quite right and you can do a form of arbitrage.

You can't bet, or trade, on probability alone when the payout reflects those probabilities. This is why those retards who make a hundred 1 pip wins speak tonnes of shit until the inevitable trade they hold onto that tanks them. At some point the numbers swing both ways, and if you don't have something over the basic stats then the numbers will fuck you hard and punish you for churning money.

At the end of the day you have to actually be more right than wrong. You have to know something more than the vanilla knowledge available to everyone else. You have to know something that gives you an edge.

If you know djokovic took a ball to the balls earlier that day then maybe you'd bet against him because you know he'll be running slower due to testicular torsion. That's an edge. It's an edge over knowing "he usually wins more".

If a game is completely random, then players doing well or poorly is due entirely to luck, and a belief that these types of past patterns have any effect on future outcomes is merely gambler's fallacy. But we've already discussed this, we're starting to go around in circles now. Belief in lucky numbers, or streaks, or patterns of numbers repeating themselves -- without any provable mathematical basis -- is getting into the realm of superstition.

Sports like tennis are not random games of chance. They are a completely different proposition, as there is an element of skill involved.