In the late 80's Jonathan Sparke launched CityIndex the first Spreadbetting site, followed in the early 90's by SportingIndex and IG Sports. City Index has now ceased to offer sports spread betting, but Cantor Sport and Sports Spread have come online. Until recently punters had to make very large bets to utilise the spread betting sites. This has changed and punters can now sign up with a £10 minimum deposit and depending on the site 1p or £1 minimum bet.
Very simply it is gambling on the answer to a question being higher or lower and placing a bet to sell the result will be lower than the prediction or buying the result will be higher than the prediction. With spread betting you can bet before the start of an event or you can bet during play, known as in-running, with some sites this could continue almost to the final whistle.
There are three types of spread betting.
Decided by the total number of times something occurs in a sports event, such as how many free kicks in a football match, tackles in a rugby game or runs in a cricket match.
Blackburn are playing Manchester United and the free kicks spread is set at 30-35 you believe the quantity will be higher so you buy at 35. You are correct and there are 40 free kicks, you bought at 35 and there were 40 so the difference was 5 so profit, which on a £10 stake will be 5 x £10 = £50
The fact that your team wins is not the point of this bet, but by how many points they win by.
England are playing Italy in the six nations. The bookies price it at 76-80 this is their prediction that England will beat Italy by between 76 and 80 points. You think that the match will be a closer affair, so you sell (go lower) at 76. You still think England will win but the odds of 1/15 offered by high street bookies is not worth the effort. However England do even better than expected and win 90 points to 6 You sold at 76, the result was 84 the difference between 90 and 6 so you are 18 points wrong your loss at £10 stake is 18 x 10 = £180.
These markets award points to the winner, runner-up, third and sometimes even lower positions depending on the sport.
The prime examples come from race meetings, spread firms offer a performance index on the favourites for the day and the jockeys competing. The principal is the same, Winner=25 points; Runner-up =10 points; Third =5 points. Example Rider has 6 rides in a day and the spread on his performances is 46-50, you think he will collect more points so you buy the spread at 50. He has 2 winners, two seconds and no others so at 25 for a win and 10 for a runner-up he collects 70 points, you bought at 50 and the total was 70 so the difference is 20. Profit at £10 stake is 20 x £10 = £200.
This is the basics of how the system works but what are the advantages to you the punter in spread betting and why open an account. There are two good reasons:
The excitement and the chance of BIG winnings or losses
The major reason is this form of betting offers better odds when you want to bet on favourites whether they are horses, dogs or football teams. When you are certain of the result and have an idea of what the scores will be you can work out if you should buy or sell which will allow you to bet with more interest on a predictable result.
There is a choice of seven spread betting sites and we have prioritised them based on supporting a novice and then the experienced punter.
| Novice | Experienced | |
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1 BetHilo |
1 Sporting Index |
