Betting Terminology

• Balance: the amount of money in your account.
• Buy: if you think the final result will be higher than the price quoted, you would buy the market.
• Buying price: the higher of the two prices that make up the spread; this is the price that we offer you if you wish to buy.
• Close: stopping your bet before the market has settled in order to reduce your loss or take a profit.
• Hedge: to place a bet against your existing position in order to reduce your exposure.
• In play / in-running: betting on a market while the event is taking place, as opposed to placing your bet before the start.
• Index: a market with allocated points for each potential result. With an index in a football match, for example, a team is awarded 25 points for a win, 10 points for a draw and 0 points for a loss.
• Jolly: the favourite; typically refers to the favourite in a horse race.
• Long: if you have placed a buy bet, you are said to be long of a market. You want the makeup to be high.
• Long term: a market on a series of events rather than an individual event. The market on who will win the Premier League, for example, is a long term market.
• Make-up: the final result of an event. If a football match finishes 3-0, the make-up of the total goals market is 3.
• Margin: additional money that we ask you to deposit to cover the potential loss of existing position.
• Match bet: a market between two players or two teams where you bet on the margin of victory.
• Market suspended: occasionally markets will be temporarily unavailable for trade. We say in this case that the market is suspended.
• Max make-up: the highest possible result that a market can settle at. Occasionally this is determined by the structure of the market (e.g. the max make-up in a 100 Index is 100). Occasionally this is specified arbitrarily to reduce the volatility of the market (e.g. the max make-up in a national hunt horse racing match bet is 15 lengths).
• Mid-point: the half-way point between the buy price and sell price. If the spread is 7-9, the midpoint is 8. This is what we believe the “true price” to be.
• Min make-up: the lowest possible result that a market can settle at.
• Monkey: an old horse racing term for £500.
• Multi corners: the number or corners in the first half multiplied by the numbers of corners in the second half.
• Non-runner: a horse, team or individual that does not contest the event having originally been entered. The presence of a non-runner may necessitate the market being re-priced- if this happens in a horse racing event it is called a Rule 4.
• Open position: a bet that has not yet been settled.
• Performance (index): a market which aggregates points for various metrics within the event. A football performance index, for example, might award a team points for wins, goals, and corners while penalising them for yellow and red cards.
• Pony: an old horse racing term for £25.
• Rule 4: see non-runner.
• Sell: if you think the final result will be lower than the price quoted, you would sell the market.
• Selling price: the lower of the two prices that make up the spread, this is the price that we offer you if you wish to sell.
• Settlement: the final result of the market once the event is finished.
• Short: if you have placed a sell bet, you are said to be short of a market. You want the makeup to be low.
• Spread: the difference between the buying price and the selling price.
• Spread-free: a promotional offer which allows you to trade at the mid-point of the buying price and the selling price. If the spread of a batsman’s runs was 46-50, a spread-free bet would allow you to either buy or sell at 48.
• Shirts: a market where you bet on the aggregate shirt numbers of any players who score a goal or a try.
• Stake: the amount you bet per point.
• Supremacy: a market where you bet on the margin of victory.
• Tick: 1/10^th of a point.
• Your choice: also known as “pick ‘em”, a supremacy bet where we think the competitors are equally matched.  You can “pick” the favourite.