That fore mentioned talk show host also does a football pick contest. Included is a company from Wisconsin; American Sports Analysts. They have a service where they make picks, available for a fee on sporting events. I always thought that if I ever had a lot of money that this may be something better to invest in than the stock market.
They put their reputation behind their most highly ranked picks. If they are wrong their business will fail. The only factor in their success is that their picks be correct. Is it the same for your stock broker? What stake does a stock broker have in your buy paying off? Little to none.
With my past experience in the stock market I wonder if I would have done better with giving this company all my money. Though it would cut into my winnings to pay and go with 'only' their highest ranked picks, their record would suggest I most likely would have come out ahead.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
A different Kind of Gambling
Until I can get my highest interest credit card paid off the opportunities to sit at a live poker table will be few and far between. And it will mean starting with a short stack even if I do get the chance. But unless I bust out in one game to build up a chunk of seed money that is how it will have to be.
But there is another gamble that I have chosen to put some money towards before taking care of the immediate demands of the monthly bills. That would be investing in the stock market. Yes, with a bit of extra cash coming in I put $300 into my near extinct investment account. Without a stock transaction soon a built in fee would have nearly liquidated the account as it was.
Misfortune hardly describes my past experience in the stock market, thank you Y2K. Having lost thousands and having to extract thousands for other needs at inopportune times my investments have sat in tatters for many a year now. Recently one of two companies I had a stake in went under leaving me with nothing but ten shares in a small electronics company that paid a dividend.
Yes the stock market is a gamble. I read a small Internet article where the author described the poker betting process in the same manner as investment strategy. In terms of risk and reward. What is the factor on your potential return versus the risk. So I put more money into this dividend paying stock buying 50 shares at $4. A stock that before this economic downturn almost never went under $7 and was known to go up over twice that at times. It had been lower than $3 at its lowest and I felt a hunch to buy more when it was more than a dime lower than $4. As it was, it was sitting above $4 and came down the day after I put my bid in. Since then it has gone up over $1. But it will be the following investments, after I decide to sell this bit of fortune, that will decide how good of a decision to divert these funds was.
The reality is that life is full of risk taking on one level or the other. Life requires the ability to make decisions. Decisions that require an investment and contain no guarantee that the desired result will occur or that some unknown factor will not frustrate the expected outcome. It requires knowledge and the ability to read people and environments. All realities that can be introduced in game play.
Some may think that poker, gambling with money, would be an inappropriate way of learning these skills. I often think fondly of playing sheep's head with my family. A game where the card play determines the outcome as well as the ability to determine who your unknown partner is. The nickle and dime stakes, now supposedly illegal in Wisconsin as a favor to certain campaign contributors, were hardly life changing gains or losses but plenty to heighten the senses and hone ones skills; ones abilities to read a situation and make informed decisions.
An argument in the online poker debate is that the micro stakes that the Internet can provide actually keep people with gambling problems from going bust in other aspects of their lives. And when more and more casinos are opening up, accessible to a larger and larger portion of the population, it would seem people with a problem have greater opportunity to get into games of much greater stakes 24 hours a day. As far as the Internet I know that in Korea, where Internet use and role play gaming has been recognized as a serious problem especially for the young, they have systems that cut users off after five hours a day. And also in my previously mentioned discussion with a gentleman at the gym, he brought up the fact that at a casino, in the gambling scene, you come across a lot of seedy people you have to be careful of.
People whose lives are destroyed by gambling have been found to have other problems that contributed to their failings. I heard a report by the BBC on the radio of someone who has done a study showing that gambling actually has a positive effect for many people. Why? Because it is incredibly fun, taking the risk and dreaming of potential unimaginable success, but at the same time not depending on, or expecting, to win. People with sound decision making processes interacting in a responsible fashion. Playing games is fun and they reflect the challenges and dreams we all have in life. A release everyone can enjoy from time to time whether at the poker table or... on the monopoly board if poker isn't your kind of game.
But there is another gamble that I have chosen to put some money towards before taking care of the immediate demands of the monthly bills. That would be investing in the stock market. Yes, with a bit of extra cash coming in I put $300 into my near extinct investment account. Without a stock transaction soon a built in fee would have nearly liquidated the account as it was.
Misfortune hardly describes my past experience in the stock market, thank you Y2K. Having lost thousands and having to extract thousands for other needs at inopportune times my investments have sat in tatters for many a year now. Recently one of two companies I had a stake in went under leaving me with nothing but ten shares in a small electronics company that paid a dividend.
Yes the stock market is a gamble. I read a small Internet article where the author described the poker betting process in the same manner as investment strategy. In terms of risk and reward. What is the factor on your potential return versus the risk. So I put more money into this dividend paying stock buying 50 shares at $4. A stock that before this economic downturn almost never went under $7 and was known to go up over twice that at times. It had been lower than $3 at its lowest and I felt a hunch to buy more when it was more than a dime lower than $4. As it was, it was sitting above $4 and came down the day after I put my bid in. Since then it has gone up over $1. But it will be the following investments, after I decide to sell this bit of fortune, that will decide how good of a decision to divert these funds was.
The reality is that life is full of risk taking on one level or the other. Life requires the ability to make decisions. Decisions that require an investment and contain no guarantee that the desired result will occur or that some unknown factor will not frustrate the expected outcome. It requires knowledge and the ability to read people and environments. All realities that can be introduced in game play.
Some may think that poker, gambling with money, would be an inappropriate way of learning these skills. I often think fondly of playing sheep's head with my family. A game where the card play determines the outcome as well as the ability to determine who your unknown partner is. The nickle and dime stakes, now supposedly illegal in Wisconsin as a favor to certain campaign contributors, were hardly life changing gains or losses but plenty to heighten the senses and hone ones skills; ones abilities to read a situation and make informed decisions.
An argument in the online poker debate is that the micro stakes that the Internet can provide actually keep people with gambling problems from going bust in other aspects of their lives. And when more and more casinos are opening up, accessible to a larger and larger portion of the population, it would seem people with a problem have greater opportunity to get into games of much greater stakes 24 hours a day. As far as the Internet I know that in Korea, where Internet use and role play gaming has been recognized as a serious problem especially for the young, they have systems that cut users off after five hours a day. And also in my previously mentioned discussion with a gentleman at the gym, he brought up the fact that at a casino, in the gambling scene, you come across a lot of seedy people you have to be careful of.
People whose lives are destroyed by gambling have been found to have other problems that contributed to their failings. I heard a report by the BBC on the radio of someone who has done a study showing that gambling actually has a positive effect for many people. Why? Because it is incredibly fun, taking the risk and dreaming of potential unimaginable success, but at the same time not depending on, or expecting, to win. People with sound decision making processes interacting in a responsible fashion. Playing games is fun and they reflect the challenges and dreams we all have in life. A release everyone can enjoy from time to time whether at the poker table or... on the monopoly board if poker isn't your kind of game.
Friday, September 18, 2009
Luck
I debated with a gentleman at the gym the other day on whether poker was a game of skill or luck. He claimed that the fact casinos wont ban supposed good poker players, but will blackjack players, that poker was not a game of skill. The problem with that argument is in blackjack the house pays the winner and in poker the house takes a rake out of the pot no matter who wins or loses.
Poker is a game of skill but luck cannot be ignored. And in tournament play you often have to roll the dice. When your stack doesn't grow with the rising blinds at some point you have to go all-in with the first thing that looks like a respectable hand. Or you just have bad luck. When your nuts are busted on the river. Some may say the most money is lost at a table when more than one have a full house. A rare hand that you wouldn't usually expect there to be two of.
I happened to mention to my wife that she always seems to have good luck when I am around... And that I have bad luck when she is nearby. At least that is how it has been on our three trips to the casino to hit the poker room. My stack grew while she was off playing slots or perusing the casino, but I couldn't help but lose when she came into the room to watch or just wait in the poker room lobby.
We went to take advantage of a slot promotion where they give you $5 for playing $20 on the slot machine. Came away at a loss. When I went by myself I came out ahead nearly $6.
I noticed it with dealers also. You'll make several big hands with one dealer and then the dealer changes and the hands dry up. Or proximity with a dealer. I've had the same dealer on more than one occasion and when sitting directly next to them I did very poorly. But on another occasion when sitting across from them I did well.
I sat down at a table and an older lady across from me put in all her chips in despair on my first hand. She was their with a real grinder, perhaps her husband. She won and looked across at me with a smile. She mentioned she had given up. She had been losing all night. Then she won again... and again and she kept smiling. She obviously thought my arrival changed her fortune.
Then there are the people who just upset the whole atmosphere. The two guys who keep talking it up, standing saying they are going out for a cigarette but then don't go. Play another hand, never clear if they are going or staying. If they are in the next hand or not. Even the dealer seemed to get a bit annoyed. Messes up the whole mood, rhythm of the game. Language usually isn't a big problem. The dealers work hard to discourage any abusive language.
Of course in a ring game many of these misfortunes can be overcome with discipline play and keeping an even temperament. I had been doing poorly recently on the Internet with my play money stack rocketing down after going well beyond half a million. We just recently got a new more secure Internet connection and a new computer with the latest protection software and my luck has changed.
Only Frank could get away with those lyrics.
Our local casino in "Ante" their monthly publication actually has a star gazer. You can find not only your luck days but specific times down to the minute when your luck will be running high... If you can believe it.
Poker is a game of skill but luck cannot be ignored. And in tournament play you often have to roll the dice. When your stack doesn't grow with the rising blinds at some point you have to go all-in with the first thing that looks like a respectable hand. Or you just have bad luck. When your nuts are busted on the river. Some may say the most money is lost at a table when more than one have a full house. A rare hand that you wouldn't usually expect there to be two of.
I happened to mention to my wife that she always seems to have good luck when I am around... And that I have bad luck when she is nearby. At least that is how it has been on our three trips to the casino to hit the poker room. My stack grew while she was off playing slots or perusing the casino, but I couldn't help but lose when she came into the room to watch or just wait in the poker room lobby.
We went to take advantage of a slot promotion where they give you $5 for playing $20 on the slot machine. Came away at a loss. When I went by myself I came out ahead nearly $6.
I noticed it with dealers also. You'll make several big hands with one dealer and then the dealer changes and the hands dry up. Or proximity with a dealer. I've had the same dealer on more than one occasion and when sitting directly next to them I did very poorly. But on another occasion when sitting across from them I did well.
I sat down at a table and an older lady across from me put in all her chips in despair on my first hand. She was their with a real grinder, perhaps her husband. She won and looked across at me with a smile. She mentioned she had given up. She had been losing all night. Then she won again... and again and she kept smiling. She obviously thought my arrival changed her fortune.
Then there are the people who just upset the whole atmosphere. The two guys who keep talking it up, standing saying they are going out for a cigarette but then don't go. Play another hand, never clear if they are going or staying. If they are in the next hand or not. Even the dealer seemed to get a bit annoyed. Messes up the whole mood, rhythm of the game. Language usually isn't a big problem. The dealers work hard to discourage any abusive language.
Of course in a ring game many of these misfortunes can be overcome with discipline play and keeping an even temperament. I had been doing poorly recently on the Internet with my play money stack rocketing down after going well beyond half a million. We just recently got a new more secure Internet connection and a new computer with the latest protection software and my luck has changed.
Only Frank could get away with those lyrics.
Our local casino in "Ante" their monthly publication actually has a star gazer. You can find not only your luck days but specific times down to the minute when your luck will be running high... If you can believe it.
Saturday, September 5, 2009
A Day at the Races
Not today, but last Saturday. And not a day, but a couple of hours. And not at the races, but at the OTB room at the casino which is just a couple miles from my home.
A local talk show host has an investment in a race horse. Being well studied in the sport of horse racing he often has tips for races and horses he has confidence in. The Friday before last he had two such tips for The Travers Cup at Saratoga. I had put some money down on some extensive tips he had given in the past and lost more than I had won. If I had been more conservative in my bets, sticking with the top three horses he recommended, I would have come in ahead. For The Travers Cup last week he gave two picks, not the favorite, that I decided to pursue.
It was a $16 investment. What attracted me to this race was the potential for these two horses with the favorite to fill in the top three. So a $6 trifecta box. Than another $6 dollars in $2 exacta boxes and $2 each for his picks to place. Then, the wait for race 12, The Travers Cup.
I was early, or maybe it was just the rain that delayed the race. Capt. Candyman Can looked attractive to me in race 11 and thought of putting $2 to show but didn't. It would have paid. Thought of putting $4 on the favorite for race 12 to show, #4 Quality Road, but the rewards were too small for the investment. It would have paid. Then I thought of putting $2 on the race 12 long shot to show, #1 Hold Me Back, and that also would have paid.
Yes, #1 Hold Me Back, the long shot came in second messing up my chances at the trifecta and exacta boxes with #2 Charitable Man, the first tip coming in 4th, #4 Quality Road, the favorite coming in 3rd, and #6 Summer Bird, the second tip finishing first. The three making up my boxes. Summer Bird paid something over double to place.
But it was an interesting experience rubbing elbows and watching the races with some serious followers of the sport for awhile. And together with the potential for a great return, a good chance at hundreds of dollars, a day worthwhile. The information was obviously excellent. You just never know what's going to happen though. But you never stop learning. I may go back, not too soon, if I see a chance for some good returns investing in boxes, and hedging my bets with some solid picks and maybe $2 on a long shot potential.
A little windfall would have been great. Always seems to be opportunity before me but we just can't catch a break. It's as if something keeps holding me back.
A local talk show host has an investment in a race horse. Being well studied in the sport of horse racing he often has tips for races and horses he has confidence in. The Friday before last he had two such tips for The Travers Cup at Saratoga. I had put some money down on some extensive tips he had given in the past and lost more than I had won. If I had been more conservative in my bets, sticking with the top three horses he recommended, I would have come in ahead. For The Travers Cup last week he gave two picks, not the favorite, that I decided to pursue.
It was a $16 investment. What attracted me to this race was the potential for these two horses with the favorite to fill in the top three. So a $6 trifecta box. Than another $6 dollars in $2 exacta boxes and $2 each for his picks to place. Then, the wait for race 12, The Travers Cup.
I was early, or maybe it was just the rain that delayed the race. Capt. Candyman Can looked attractive to me in race 11 and thought of putting $2 to show but didn't. It would have paid. Thought of putting $4 on the favorite for race 12 to show, #4 Quality Road, but the rewards were too small for the investment. It would have paid. Then I thought of putting $2 on the race 12 long shot to show, #1 Hold Me Back, and that also would have paid.
Yes, #1 Hold Me Back, the long shot came in second messing up my chances at the trifecta and exacta boxes with #2 Charitable Man, the first tip coming in 4th, #4 Quality Road, the favorite coming in 3rd, and #6 Summer Bird, the second tip finishing first. The three making up my boxes. Summer Bird paid something over double to place.
But it was an interesting experience rubbing elbows and watching the races with some serious followers of the sport for awhile. And together with the potential for a great return, a good chance at hundreds of dollars, a day worthwhile. The information was obviously excellent. You just never know what's going to happen though. But you never stop learning. I may go back, not too soon, if I see a chance for some good returns investing in boxes, and hedging my bets with some solid picks and maybe $2 on a long shot potential.
A little windfall would have been great. Always seems to be opportunity before me but we just can't catch a break. It's as if something keeps holding me back.
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