Sports betting is back to accounting for more than 70% of all trading volume at the prediction market Kalshi, led by betting on tennis, baseball and hot dog eating.
All good! Happy to have the discussion. If I had to guess 1% hold would probably better than most sports books. Also most of the time when hold is this low you can treat them as a source of truth. Pinnacle has been my source of truth for tennis in the past.
So I was only talking the fees, which I see now is incorrect. Your numbers look a little high on Swiatek/Bencic based on the $0.02 spread. Do those include their trading fees?
Maybe Kalshi bakes their trading fees into their posted odds. I don't know. Probably explains why their hold would be higher than a sportsbook. All I am doing is entering their odds into a vig/hold calculator like this one (https://oddsjam.com/betting-calculators/hold).
I don’t believe they do. Think they bake it into the quantity you trade, but not the price.
For example I see the market currently at Belinda yes 23 no 78. That’s a $0.01 line. That’s equal to +335/-255. That’s a hold of 1%. Even with fees on top that’s way lower than a sports book.
I'm assuming you mean -335/+255 because if the plus number is higher than the minus number its an arbitrage. If you punch that into the hold calculator you get a hold of 5.18%.
Can you explain that to me? For DK and FD you're putting up generally 110% on Kalshi in a 50/50 market you're putting up like 101.75. Is that not correct?
The hold isn't the same for every market. It depends on the odds. Swiatek/Bencic tennis match is -291/+240, which is 3.84% hold. St. Louis/Washington in MLB is -136/+113, which is a 4.36% hold. Every market has a different hold because the odds are all different.
What’s funny is that Kalshi is one of the worst places to bet on sports due to their high hold %. Even compared to FanDuel or DraftKings
Sorry it should say +335/-355 which is equal to 23%/78% which are the percentages currently. That’s a hold of 1%
Also thanks for working through this. I’ve made some dumb mistakes here!
All good! Happy to have the discussion. If I had to guess 1% hold would probably better than most sports books. Also most of the time when hold is this low you can treat them as a source of truth. Pinnacle has been my source of truth for tennis in the past.
So I was only talking the fees, which I see now is incorrect. Your numbers look a little high on Swiatek/Bencic based on the $0.02 spread. Do those include their trading fees?
https://kalshi.com/docs/kalshi-fee-schedule.pdf
Maybe Kalshi bakes their trading fees into their posted odds. I don't know. Probably explains why their hold would be higher than a sportsbook. All I am doing is entering their odds into a vig/hold calculator like this one (https://oddsjam.com/betting-calculators/hold).
I don’t believe they do. Think they bake it into the quantity you trade, but not the price.
For example I see the market currently at Belinda yes 23 no 78. That’s a $0.01 line. That’s equal to +335/-255. That’s a hold of 1%. Even with fees on top that’s way lower than a sports book.
I'm assuming you mean -335/+255 because if the plus number is higher than the minus number its an arbitrage. If you punch that into the hold calculator you get a hold of 5.18%.
Can you explain that to me? For DK and FD you're putting up generally 110% on Kalshi in a 50/50 market you're putting up like 101.75. Is that not correct?
Hold is the tax or vig the sportsbook takes for offering a betting market. -110/-110 odds works out to a 4.76% hold.
Isn't that higher than Kalshi's 1.75%? Or I guess 3.5%
Which odds does the 1.75% hold refer to?
Kalshis taker fees.
The hold isn't the same for every market. It depends on the odds. Swiatek/Bencic tennis match is -291/+240, which is 3.84% hold. St. Louis/Washington in MLB is -136/+113, which is a 4.36% hold. Every market has a different hold because the odds are all different.