There are betting exchanges where the platform charges a commission but doesn’t care if you win or lose.
Its the same as poker. An exchange wants a bunch of equally skilled players betting against each other. If everyone has zero edge, all the money stays on the exchange betting over and over and the money eventually all goes to the exchange in commissions.
Players with a strong edge dramatically reduce the time before the losing players run out of money, meaning less commissions for the exchange.
FWIW, an exchange doesn't necessarily want a bunch of equally skilled players betting each other, they want a lopsided book on the bigger markets to attract domestic bookies and match-makers laying or staking across multiple platforms to leverage Matched betting discrepancies on promotions for new players etc...
//Players with a strong edge dramatically reduce the time before the losing players run out of money, meaning less commissions for the exchange.
Poker Players with a strong edge have a +ev Variance. Over 100 hands they're not guaranteed to be a winner. Over 10,000 hands they are.
YMMV massively in other sports, but for horse racing the big gamblers tend to only put down big money once or twice a year on maidens and trial-runners for Cheltenham or Grand National. They wouldn't touch a big festival other than for fun.
I don't know as I don't bet but it seems counter-intuitive that just charging a commission would change the dynamic.
There is 0 risk for the exchange and the bettors can only use what they put in front.
Bookies run some risk because they accept the bet first and try to hedge (or got more people to bet on the other side) later. The exchange doesn't have this problem.
Exchange doesn't even need to charge commission cause they make money on float.
on edit: so the problem is that of course the other user can default, but that is not the exchange screwing with you because it is to their benefit.
the above is much less likely if you are national, but there may be small competitors with an advantage live this you are trying to compete with
That’s what the moving price / odds is for, to rebalance the willingness to take both sides of the bet.
A stock exchange won’t start holding a book of shares to give “better” prices to customers. What would that even mean? If the price is better for the buyer it will be worse for the seller! (If you mean that they will buy for a high price and sell for a low price to keep all customers happy maybe the customers won’t go anywhere but the “exchange” will go bankrupt.)
Why would a betting exchange be different? Does Betfair for example act like you suggests or is it just something you’re imagining?
NYSE and NASDAQ do complete with each other for companies to list on them. (as do other exchanges around the world). When a company is on more than one exchange there are people who make it their job to run "arbitrage" - this is they buy on one and sell on the other anytime the prices are different and this keeps things in check.
It is also valid for betting platform to run arbitrage with their competitors - but various anti-monopoly laws and other such things should(!) get in the way. I don't know what they are doing about this or exactly what the law says. As such I don't know what Betfair is really doing, but I know this is a risk they somehow either take (which if they are national might be low enough), or if they somehow get arbitrage done.
And betting platform is normally both the exchange and the broker. As such they have this risk and need to mitigate it while staying within the law. There are many ways to abuse mitigation that need to be illegal and so it must be hard to mitigate - this doesn't mean impossible.
Betting exchanges are different from bookmakers.
https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Betting_exchanges
Maybe you’re now using “platforms” to refer to everything but the discussion was specific to exchanges as opposed to bookmakers.
How Kalshi and prediction markets are disrupting sports betting: https://www.espn.com/espn/betting/story/_/id/45377686/kalshi...
As such I still need to stand by what I said: at least for now the online platforms are not exchanges (though some are trying to move that way)
> "We are simply an exchange. So we sit between people that are buying contracts on a yes and a no side. We don't win by people losing. And we don't lose by people winning. We simply sit in between that transaction."
I don’t know what else would you like to be told. That’s an exchange, with one user taking one side and another taking the other side. No brokers are involved when end-users connect directly to the exchange.
Wikipedia mentions that they would like other platforms to give access to the exhange, and the existence of market makers (one affiliate company, one independent company) that may provide liquidity. But the basic exchange is user-to-user.