A few days ago, my friends and I at work were arguing about betting. They said betting is always unprofitable in the long run. I said, betting is profitable.
When I was younger, we grew up in a neighborhood in Thika, Kenya where young people liked football so much. Some could meet up every evening at around 4pm and play it. Others never missed a Premier League or Champions League game. And among these young people, betting was also a way of life.
During weekends, most people would wake up to first check the games of the day and placed their bets on games around the world but especially in Europe. From what I saw, some won, most lost, And some won big. In the neighborhood, there also existed a military barracks and therefore soldiers lived among us. I observed that soldiers could place bets more frequently than anyone else, and they won them too, more frequently than most people. I would say, they know how to play this game of chance.
Betting had become so common that some young men made it their careers. How this happened was, as betting companies in Kenya became so famous, they started including games from lower leagues around the world and other sports such as Basketball and Rugby. With this setup, it meant games were played every day around the world- therefore everyday was harvest day. Young men could buy small exercise books from where they could analyse games and place very informed bets. Reports were, some even had access to sites which gave them odds from fixed matches.
High school kids couldn’t wait to break, so they can bet. Young men took this as full time jobs. Boda bodas took this as second jobs. Mama mbogas with their grocery stores had their sons place bets for them on their phones, all they needed to do was provide the betting capital – which was as little as sh50. Lads started forming groupings where they could meet up, do thorough analysis of games and place bets they thought were best. And given the purchasing power of the community, bets were placed with amounts ranging from sh50 to sh200 among the young men. Soldiers took it a step higher and could often place bets of up to sh1000 and more.
What made the betting industry to grow so fast was how they allowed the common person to place bets with as low as sh50 and they could earn as much as sh4000 from this. The young betting lads called themselves investors or in swahili, wawekezaji.
From what I saw and heard, this business was profitable to everyone who engaged in it. Look! even grocery store owners, professional teachers, soldiers and shop owners came into this and placed bets. They never needed to know who Arsenal were or who Chelsea or Juve or Barca were. They just needed to have their 50 bob and give it to their sons or friends of their sons. And they would do the rest. Sometimes, they just wanted the bet placed safely. This meant, all they wanted is for you to choose teams you were ‘sure‘ would win and place the bet for them. That would sometimes mean they get as low as sh300 from a sh50 bet, but see, thats 6x what they had in the beginning. That could probably be as much as they sold in the grocery store that whole day! The same thing happened to bodabodas, masons and other hand-to-mouth earners.
This business was profitable to everyone who got involved. The math for this is simple, just look at how much they paid in and how much they got in return overall. See which column, whether costs or earnings, had a larger value. Seldom would you get a betting person who had the costs column being larger.
So, back to our argument, my friends argument was as follows: That betting was only profitable to the betting company and not the betting individuals. That this was as so because, once people win bets, they often returned all the money to betting. That people lost too many times its mathematically impossible to have had more earnings than what you’ve spent on betting platforms. That those who bet were often reckless and could squander all the money they won, and therefore, betting was unprofitable. Some said they tried this while they were younger for a short while and they couldn’t say they won this. Another one actually came in with mathematical logic to show that betting was not profitable. I would have believed their arguments since they looked like they made sense. But…
…there was this issue of what I had seen with my own eyes. Young men gambled, and they got money out of it. And therefore, I made my case too, providing a counter argument for each of the claims.
For one, I do not disagree that betting companies win big. This is true. One article we read online at that time said betting companies earned up to 95% profit. I didn’t get how they reached to that figure. But for me it was this simple: Consider a betting company and 1 million users who are ready and willing to bet. What the betting company brings to the table is just a platform to allow people to place bets and pay them out when they win. Thats all. They do not put money in the platform as bets. All money that will be deposited on this virtual wallet comes from the 1 million persons ready to bet. That means, whatever amount will remain in that platform after winners are paid off, is in fact profit to the betting company. It doesn’t matter what amount it is, provided its not a negative figure, that is profit. They never deposited any money there themselves.
Therefore, if the amount placed in bets by the Betters is sh1 billion, for instance, then after games are finished, the winners require sh900million in settlements, the company still has sh100 million left in its wallet – WHICH THEY DIDN’T HAVE AT THE BEGINNING. That’s it! And given the number of people placing bets being too high, and the terms of service they pen out, with restrictions preventing you from investing too much so you can’t win too big, how will the company ever get losses? They will never. In fact, such companies can only put targets of high numbers they expect to get and count it against what they will actually get to see if they have gotten what they want or not. If they get less than their target, they can call that loss – even though its not.
Secondly, for you to see how betting makes profit, you need to look at it this way: The betting company is in contract with individuals, not a team of betting people. For if you think of it as its betting company on one side verses all Betters on the other side, then this will give you the the Betters team always losses – since we have agreed in my first point above betting companies don’t make loses. But this is a logical fallacy.
The correct way to view this is to realize that if I place a bet, I am in contract with the betting company INDIVIDUALLY. Am not doing it for the team of Betters. So if I loose, I lose my money. If I win, the company pays me alone based on my deposits. They don’t pay all of us because I have won. So as Betters, we can each get wins on our days, but all together loose more money in the deal. The rules of betting are well curved out to ensure in any betting session, more people will loose bets that those who gain. Therefore, there should be enough money collected to pay off the winners and remain with some.
Also, different people may win bets in different sessions, and the wins they get are more than the amount they use to place bets. Consider our mama mboga example we had earlier. If she gave her son 50 bob to place bets for her, and earned 300 from it, this means she now has extra 250 she can return to betting without really making losses against the betting company. Yes! If she decides to re-invest the sh250 profits, with each bet still being sh50, it will take her 5 rounds of loosing before she says she’s making loses.
Finally, the arguments on the recklessness of betting persons is also invalid. If you argue that, betting persons will squander the profits they made after winning, does this really mean they did not earn profit? What are they squandering if its not profits from betting? In fact, the fact that you see betting lad squandering means they get profits. And this only shows the particular individual misusing moneys they get has responsibility and character issues. The same logic applies to all other forms of earnings. If you got profits from selling a cow, or profits from selling potatoes in the market, then you squander the money without purpose, two things should be clear – You have character issues and you made a good sale. Reckless use of money does not show you did not make profit.
Nowadays, the betting industry in Kenya still runs but not with much valor as long ago. The Kenyan government through Ministry of Internal Affairs CS Dr. Fred Matiangi did a number on the betting industry. They introduced hefty taxes and new rules that made them flee. Only a few resilient ones remain. And others bet from companies in other countries. The government said it needed its young people to do actual work and not just bet all day, refusing to take on nation building jobs. Some say, betting was scrapped because the betting companies did not re-invest the money in the country – on our sports clubs – and instead went to sponsor European teams.
I wish I kept some screenshots of the days when I saw too many good wins from bets. I still see them on other platforms such as Twitter or WhatsApp when different people set them as statuses. I have also seen men take their children to school with betting money. Others paid off a loans with betting money ( there are these motor bikes called Bajaj and TVS people get on hire purchase terms then they pay some amount daily until they finish up buying them. Looks a good scheme but is rather exploitative since you pay much more than you would. But most people especially in rural places don’t have sh100k to drop at a go for a bike! So they take the deal. These amounts are paid for with betting money sometimes) Others built big chunks of their houses with betting money. People did stuff with this quick money.
So, even though I take a stand that betting is profitable, why then don’t I bet? I will list my reasons below very plainly:
- Betting is gambling, and gambling is not a good thing. If it were, it would be possible for gamblers to take up big jobs in organizations and government. But they don’t, they are not allowed. The moment you identify as a gambler, there is only so far you can go career wise. You can’t get trusted with big things!
- Gamblers have a habit of making bad decisions. A gambler, not being drunk or high, will keep adding money to a Game of Chance thinking this time they will nail it. They end up using children’s school fees, house rent, medication money on gambling. It brings them and others a lot of pain. It grows a persons greed and ponders everything they have based on this. This was not the man I wanted to be.
- Gamblers are often lazy. Of course since money comes easy, out of nothing, they don’t do normal stuff well. They are under performers in may other areas.
- Gambling can quickly lead to dishonesty. I mentioned fixed matches above. Now, some people want to win a lot of money so much they organize with players in low leagues to fix matches so bets can go a certain way. So, people work to ruin the beautiful game to earn more. Its not the way to earn money.
- Gamblers lack focus.
- Gambling causes a lot of hatefulness. You realize that if a player in football team caused his team a goal, which caused the team a win – and effectively caused you a bet, you develop some form of hate for this player. You curse the guy, you wish he is sold and does not play for your team again. But looking at it philosophically, there is no legitimate reason to hate this one. He is doing his work playing football, games have winners and losers, he doesn’t know who you are and you show so much hate – for what, missed goal or a handball? There was a Colombian player who scored an own goal and cost his country a win against USA. The lad was shot dead as soon as he landed home. Word has it, gamblers who had placed high stake bets were responsible for this. See how much hate this breads!
These are some of the things I learned by observing people who bet and also during some weekend when I tried my hand on betting. I placed sh50 bet on a 3 game bet and 2 failed. I lost. Then I looked for another sh50 and placed bets on some few other teams, I lost again. On the same day, before the night went out, I then looked for another 50 bob and placed bets on 3 games, I won this time. I won sh256. Overall, I got profits by the way, since I spent sh150 and now have sh256.
But I realized how scientific this is meant to be. There is a feeling in us not to loose and this makes you keep wanting to spend a little more to get more. If you don’t get control of yourself, you’ll get into loans just to bet. Its wrong. Betting companies know this and make the whole thing so enticing with the odds they create and other offers. Additionally, you don’t get any peace of mind while trying to make bets and while waiting for them. When you loose, you feel like you’ve lost the amount you were to receive, and not the actual amount you placed. You are so anxious you can’t get anything else done until you get to know whether you’re winning or loosing.
In conclusion, what am I saying?
- Betting is always profitable to the betting company.
- If you bet long enough, betting is profitable to you as an individual. How you use your profits is another matter.
- You cannot out-profit a betting company. They pen down rules that limit you from becoming a bigger winner than them.
- Betting is gambling and it brings same challenges gambling brings to a society and individuals.
- The way different levels of people bet is different. Hustlers place little amounts such as sh50, sh200 and earn a few thousands. Soldiers place a few hundreds or thousands and earn tens of thousands.
In the end, what I mean is, betting can be profitable, but put yourself far away from it!