Strange odds

[Aragorn78]

Some weeks ago one man here asked what is the difference between Asian Handicap -0.5 of a team and straight win for this team. I told him that there is no difference /because both bets wins if this team wins and both bets loses if this team doesn't win/, but this man was not convinced and today I saw something which made me understand why he asked it.

I don't bet on 1X2 but today I took a look at the odds for Barcelona - Real Madrid and Belenenses - Benfica in one of the best bookies and what did I see:

Barcelona - Real Madrid 1.83 3.30 4.33

Belenenses - Benfica 3.75 3.25 1.83

OK, but when I took a look at the Asian Handicap section in the same bookie I saw the following:

Barcelona (-0.5) - Real Madrid (+0.5) 1.975 1.925

Belenenses (+0.5) - Benfica (-0.5) 1.875 1.975

You see that 1.83 and 1.975 are two different things! And the difference is not small at all!

Why is this difference? I doubt there are many idiots who want to bet on Barcelona /or Benfica/ and will bet at odds 1.83 instead of AH-0.5 at 1.975.

/By the way the Double chance for Real gives us: 3.30*4.33/(3.30+4.33) = 1.87, the Double chance for Belenenses 3.75*3.25/(3.75+3.25) = 1.74 and again Asian +0.5 has much bigger value./

Please someone who has an idea to tell us, I am very interested.

[Beezeri]

It's the payout%...bookies have better profit margin for 1X2 bets than AH bets. Most of the bookies pays around 92-93% for the straight winner bets when the percentage for AH bets is around 97-98%.

And AH bets eliminates the chance of a draw...(not in case if're you betting on a clear favourite thou)

[bufe]

The margin of that specific bookie (like Pinnacle and some others) is higher in case of a 3-way-outcome than a 2-way-outcome(asian hp) bet. If they want to be competitive in the asian-hp market, this is inevitable. That's all.

[Aragorn78]

I know that the margin for 1X2 is bigger than this for the Asian Handicap /it is normal the margin for an event with two possible outcomes to be bigger than the margin for an event with three possible outcomes/ but despite this fact this difference looks to me too big.

Anyway, thanks for the answers.

[zbrochu]

Asian handicaps market is very fluid. Prices frequently change in response to demand. Unlike Fixed Odds market where odds tend not to change much on a particular game.