chinman.com

Public Zone 公開區 => Bookwyrm 書蟲天地 => Topic started by: chin on 11 February 2009, 01:18:39

Title: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: chin on 11 February 2009, 01:18:39
The Intellectual Foundation of YB

My first working copy was photocopied from the HKU library.

By the time I saw this on Amazon in 2003, it was priced at US$500. I didn't need the book any more by then but bought it as a souvenir.

I did a search on Amazon today (10-Feb-09). There are 5 copies for sell, from US$1,650 to US$2,450!

But for those who are capable of understand and implement the concept, these prices are million dollar bargains!
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: chin on 26 March 2009, 04:52:28
Just happened two days ago I went to Amazon and found out there is a 2008 edition. With the new edition, the price went down to just below US$90 per copy. The editors explains why publishing the 2008 eidtion in the following new preface.

I just ordered the new 2008 edition, plus the Handbook which covers new paper and research in recent years.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: oo8 on 27 March 2009, 15:14:55
Should we buy out all of the original copies and re-post them to Amazon for USD10,000 each . . . . . . . .    ;D
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: chin on 27 March 2009, 20:21:51
 :)

Let's see who may buy...  ;)

- libraries and schools: they probably buy the new 2008 version because it's cheaper.  :P
- people not in the business but want to get in: they probably just borrow from library and photocopy, just like what we did   ::)
- people already in the business and not successful: do they have $10k?  ;D
- people already in the business and successful: they can pay a lot, and probably they already have one.  8)

BTW 5 years ago Bill said he had a few copies and can give me one. But we never got the chance to follow up on that.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: chin on 03 April 2009, 14:55:26
The books arrived today. Alan Woods co-authored one of the shorter papers in the Handbook.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: kido on 12 September 2009, 00:16:49
The books arrived today. Alan Woods co-authored one of the shorter papers in the Handbook.

Wow, what a book. At first glance I thought you mean in HK$, shortly after I found it's in US$.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: kido on 14 September 2009, 23:46:53
Wow, what a book. At first glance I thought you mean in HK$, shortly after I found it's in US$.

Right, that's the book you mentioned.

http://books.google.com/books?id=HX2xapyqENsC&lpg=PP1&dq=Efficiency%20of%20Racetrack%20Betting%20Markets&hl=zh-TW&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q=&f=false (http://books.google.com/books?id=HX2xapyqENsC&lpg=PP1&dq=Efficiency%20of%20Racetrack%20Betting%20Markets&hl=zh-TW&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q=&f=false)
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: chin on 18 September 2009, 00:09:40
Almost the whole book?!
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: kido on 18 September 2009, 01:52:35
No, just some pages.... otherwise no one will buy the  book.

Particular interested in Bill Benter's paper because he's an famous quan who really built a profitable model.

Just a thought of so many kinds of 'predictions', there are 2 kinds of number crunching which I think they're fundamentally different.  

(A) People who build models based solely on the odds/pools/etc figures and construct math. model to fit the past data and use the model to find out any "odd" in the odds and bet on these "odd" such that his expect return > 0.

(B)  People who build models based on past horse performance, and construct math models to model its behaviour and use these whole bunches of models to predict the chances of winning and/or their ranking.

For (A), they're not really interested in finding who is the winner, but care which betting strategy (or combination of strategies) provides an edge to the betting.  For (B), they're actively seeking the winner, they care the winner.  Also, I think there might be (C) , which is the combination of (A)+(B).

Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: chin on 18 September 2009, 06:39:44
Using invesment market terms

(A) = technical analysis (think guys who look at price charts and talk "shoulders")
(B) = fundamental analysis (think guys who visit companies and read financial statements and create ratios)
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: kido on 23 September 2009, 14:48:06
Using invesment market terms

(A) = technical analysis (think guys who look at price charts and talk "shoulders")
(B) = fundamental analysis (think guys who visit companies and read financial statements and create ratios)

It's hard to tell which approach is better because they're basically "climbing up the hill from 2 different side".  At first (B) sounds better because you're drilling into "why" a particular horse win, but since "luck" play a major role, and the number of examples to tune the model parameters are scarce, plus past performance (of particular horse) will change over time and doesn't imply future goodness, it would be difficult to arrive such models, or the model comes up with is not accurate.

(A) on the other hand, uses little domain knowledge.  It gets into think "how" I could profit from a particular strategy, the math model come up with is influenced lesser by change over time, (well, this needs to be proved, it's only my feeling) and the performance of a particular horse, and the environment.  Hence this model is easier to implement.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: chin on 23 September 2009, 15:22:34
In the general financial market, I don't know if the chartist used any holdout sample to test their forecasting techniques. A few people I know who use charts all just learn some patterns from books or other people, then eyeball the chart, and predict the whatever from that. In my opinion, this is just guessing and just as good/bad from the general public or sentiment. And just happened all these chartist I know are stock brokers, who really are not known to predict the market well.

And it just happened that I know a few fundamentists very well and they generally can consistently outperform the market. I think that if you invest knowing the true reason for the decision, you can sleep better without needing to look at the market everyday to check if your "pattern" hold.

For betting races, the closest to "technical" betting is arbitrage between pools.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: hangchoi on 23 September 2009, 21:42:09
In the general financial market, I don't know if the chartist used any holdout sample to test their forecasting techniques. A few people I know who use charts all just learn some patterns from books or other people, then eyeball the chart, and predict the whatever from that. In my opinion, this is just guessing and just as good/bad from the general public or sentiment. And just happened all these chartist I know are stock brokers, who really are not known to predict the market well.

And it just happened that I know a few fundamentists very well and they generally can consistently outperform the market. I think that if you invest knowing the true reason for the decision, you can sleep better without needing to look at the market everyday to check if your "pattern" hold.

For betting races, the closest to "technical" betting is arbitrage between pools.

Hmmm.....I don't think those chartists are doing a good job. I did read a few books about stock chart analysis and compared the "theory" with those analysis made by the chartists on TV. I can say that almost 90% of those "Chartist" are applying their "chart analysis" WRONGLY.........I don't know why....maybe they exercise some of their discretion on the chart theory......

An obvious example is that they use to say that the stock price will be up after a cup and handle pattern....but indeed there are at least 5 more criteria to meet for a cup and handle pattern to show a future uptrend.......

Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: kido on 29 September 2009, 13:27:37
In the general financial market, I don't know if the chartist used any holdout sample to test their forecasting techniques. A few people I know who use charts all just learn some patterns from books or other people, then eyeball the chart, and predict the whatever from that. In my opinion, this is just guessing and just as good/bad from the general public or sentiment. And just happened all these chartist I know are stock brokers, who really are not known to predict the market well.

And it just happened that I know a few fundamentists very well and they generally can consistently outperform the market. I think that if you invest knowing the true reason for the decision, you can sleep better without needing to look at the market everyday to check if your "pattern" hold.

For betting races, the closest to "technical" betting is arbitrage between pools.

Right, being a fundamentalist is at least more comfortable than a chartist because they know what they're doing.  Not just action simply by a spotting a certain 'pattern'.  In mention of the holdout sample, I could say there are certain methods to generate 'holdout' samples to test their model's validilities.  In comparing the races and the stock markets, I think stock market is far more complicated than a horse racing system.  You can say that the racing system is a small, closed system, factor affecting the system is limited. 

The only thing I usually agree with chartists are the 250-moving-average.  Using computer modeling, it's quite true that the bypassing the 250-day moving average is a good sign of turning market.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: wongyan on 29 September 2009, 22:51:50
pure chartist can really be a fatal fault.  Since all the "dealers" know all shapes of charts, they can easily create a situation for you to sell (or they called cut-loss) your stock at lower than reasonable price.  i.e. they can create fear when they want to be greedy.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: hangchoi on 30 September 2009, 00:34:13
pure chartist can really be a fatal fault.  Since all the "dealers" know all shapes of charts, they can easily create a situation for you to sell (or they called cut-loss) your stock at lower than reasonable price.  i.e. they can create fear when they want to be greedy.

Well....it is difficult to say....somehow they act the same way because they know the pattern. It is like chicken and egg problem.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: kido on 07 October 2009, 12:05:32
Going back to the book, I finally ordered this book from Amazon, hardcover, cost about HK$700 (including the shipping+handling), not as deal as previously mentioned.  This book should worthed to be owned, and I think this book is what I'm expected for, not previous 計得精彩.
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: chin on 08 October 2009, 02:52:27
Going back to the book, I finally ordered this book from Amazon, hardcover, cost about HK$700 (including the shipping+handling), not as deal as previously mentioned.  This book should worthed to be owned, and I think this book is what I'm expected for, not previous 計得精彩.

陳文中毒!  :o
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: hangchoi on 08 October 2009, 10:22:29
 ;D Luckily he was poisoned by the book, not by the horse racing........
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: kido on 08 October 2009, 15:46:16
;D Luckily he was poisoned by the book, not by the horse racing........

Too early to say... This is a whole new subject to me.  Maybe I'm really poisoned by horse racing, because the ultimate fate of reading that book will lead to betting.   ::)
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: wongyan on 19 October 2009, 00:23:07
I read the chinese book for few pages about a year ago in Tian-Di bookstore.  Then I tried to keep myself away as I don't want myself to be addicted to horse-racing. 
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: hangchoi on 19 October 2009, 00:27:29
That's no problem.....I was once a frequent horse racing better, but now.......I almost do not know the name of any horse, jockey, trainer, etc......
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: chin on 19 October 2009, 00:58:51
That's no problem.....I was once a frequent horse racing better, but now.......I almost do not know the name of any horse, jockey, trainer, etc......

That's new to me.
Why did you bet, and why stopped?
Title: Re: 書中自有黃金屋 - Efficiency of Racetrack Betting Markets
Post by: hangchoi on 19 October 2009, 09:10:53
Well....One of my "mentor" in engineering is a gambler. Sometimes I bet together with him when I was working part-time at his office. Later on, I knew an expert there who has huge knowledge in horse racing and I learned quite a lot of horse racing stuff. Sometimes I will go to racecourse with them.

After I run the company, horseracing is a gathering for me to socialise with colleagues, and customers......

Somehow, the frequency for me to bet goes low gradually for some unknown reasons and now.....I only bet when there is a huge dividend in T-T......just like buying mark-6.