Hedging in sports betting is risk insurance in betting. Its essence is to bet on the outcome of the match, the opposite of the one on which the first bet was made to compensate for possible losses. Bookmakers do not forbid such actions, as this approach is only a way to insure against the risk of losing the player, but does not guarantee him a win, the operator will not lose in any outcome.
Example
Let’s take a soccer match between Croatia and France as an example. Let’s assume a player thinks France will win and bets 1000 Euros at odds 2.10. In the course of the game, doubts about the necessary outcome of the game began to appear and the player decides to play it safe by placing a bet on the opposite outcome (Croatia will not lose – 1X) with odds 1.85 for the same amount of 1000 Euros. With the second bet you hedge, i.e. you insure your first bet against a big loss, making it minimal, but also minimizing your profit or going into a small deficit.
Calculation of possible variants
Let’s make a profit calculation for different variants of the match outcome:
- French victory: 1000*2.1 – 2000 = winnings of 100 euros (2000 – total deposits on both bets).
- Draw or Croatia’s victory: 1000*1.85 – 2000 = loss of 150 Euro, i.e. in this case we will go in minus.
Of course, if everything was successful and we would make only one bet, we would win good money: 1000*2,1 = 2100, minus 1000 rubles deposit, total 1100 euro net profit, but in real time there was a big chance to lose 1000 euro deposit, so sometimes it is better to play it safe and lose less sum (150) than we would (1000), or win much less sum (100) than we would in case of France team’s victory (1100).
The pros and cons of a hedging strategy are clear – it insures the bet from losing and a limited profit, and the smaller the bet, the smaller it is.
Hedging can be applied both in live mode and before the game, if you have any doubts about the anticipated result due to new information about the opponents’ power structure. You should keep in mind that it is almost unrealistic to make profit when holding a pre-match hedge, because of the quotes put by the bookmaker in advance. Depending on the size of the deposit and the odds after using this strategy in play, it is possible to win on one bet and lose on the second, minus on both bets, or vice versa, win on both, though it happens infrequently. For example, it is possible to win twice when insuring a parlay with one event left to win.
Conclusion
The hedging method is justified to apply in urgent cases on the live line of a bookmaker’s office to minimize the loss as a result of any unsuccessful bet, and if possible, to come out in the plus. It is not recommended to use this approach permanently – it will only increase the operator’s profit and decrease your own income. Also the option of hedging is more often used by experienced players who quickly orient themselves in the changes of quotations in the real time mode.