Betfair s Free Sport Betting Business Model

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I've been using Betfair for decades now but it's only recently I've wondered how much can this company actually make? This question is exactly what has compelled me to create this information. I will not be getting copies with their accounts from companies house, this content is going to be all conjecture determined by what I've picked up while using the web page through the years.

What has allowed me to ponder this question may be the transparency within the Betfair site. If you consider traditional bookies for example WilliamHill, Ladbrokes or Betfred, everything you have no idea on any particular sporting event is the thing that continues to be bet in whole and also on what particular outcome these bets were placed.

Take a regular Friday afternoon race meeting at say Ascot. It's the 2.30 and 5 horses are racing; the punters are logging on one of the traditional bookmakers websites and backing the many horses. The outcome is repeat the second favourite winning, we have not a clue whether everyone was backing the outsider or favourite, simply how much was bet, and what kind of profit the bookmaker made.

Now look at the same race with Betfair. The total amount exchanged for that race is given near the top of the page, this is typically about A�200,000 to get a standard horse race. Now we know that Betfair require a commission on all winnings, as well as every bet exchanged there exists a winner, so they're taking their 5% regardless of the result - about A�10,000 in this case.

So now for a quick little 'back of fag packet' maths. Approximately 40 races a day generating A�10,000 each is A�400,000 every day 1 week weekly, that's 2.8 million pounds weekly. Throw in the bigger meetings which rounds up to say 3 million, 5% which is A�150,000.

Now look at the Premiership football season. At least 12 games every week generating between A�200,000 along with a million pounds in exchanged bets, go ahead and take average and figure out the 5% commission knowning that's another A�350,000. On top of this there's the lower league and foreign games that must generate another A�100,000 in commission so we're up to Half a thousand pounds a week in revenue.

Bear planned that you could (and people do) bet on everything, golf, cricket, tennis, boxing, champions league football, International soccer, not to mention gaming. I'm beginning arrive at the conclusion that they must be getting weekly revenue within the millions, of course, sboarena if it's only A�3 million weekly, that's over 150 million annually.

I admit to having no clue if my workings are drastically wrong here, and if Betfair actually has annual revenue of A�1million or A�1billion. Neither do I have a perception of what their attorney's fees, IT costs etc add up to. What I do see is always that unlike traditional bookmakers the results of the sporting event does not have any bearing on their revenue.

To this end their main aim must be to just recruit as much customers as is possible, which poses the question; while using numerous online bookies around offering free introductory bets of up to along with overabundance A�100, then how come Betfair offer only A�30. That may be the topic of my next article.