Members of the Football Research Group, James Reade and Carl Singleton, will have their latest research on the efficiency of online football betting markets published in Finance Research Letters.
The main findings of the research are:
- Online bookmaker odds are generally unbiased for English football match results
- This online betting and prediction market is efficient
- Bookmakers do not fully use the information contained in their competitors’ odds
The research studies the odds (or prices) set by fifty-one online bookmakers, for the result outcomes in over 16,000 association football matches in England since 2010. Adapting a methodology typically used to evaluate forecast efficiency, the Efficient Market Hypothesis is tested. Odds are generally not biased when compared against actual match outcomes, both in terms of favourite-longshot or outcome types. But individual bookmakers are not efficient. Their own odds do not appear to use fully the information contained in their competitors’ odds.
Read more about it here (or here).