Is arbing / arbitrage betting illegal?

When I just started sports betting and started to gather information about arbitrage betting, I asked myself the following questions:

Is arbitrage betting illegal?

These days, in most countries, sports betting is regulated by laws. Arbitrage betting is a “guaranteed” way of making money.

Arbitrage bettors are reducing the profits of bookmakers without taking big risks of losing our money. Knowing this, you could ask yourself, is this regulated by the law?

Can you have problems after betting on arbitrage bets?

Arbitrage betting is a legal activity, it does not have any legal consequences. As an arbitrage bettor, you are simply placing legal bets on sports events at different bookmakers, on odds that are favorable for you.

I’ve been arbitrage betting for many years and I’ve used each relevant arbitrage betting software on the market. Check my article and figure out how to place arbitrage bets legally with the best arbitrage bet finders on the market.

Bookmakers have terms and conditions which you have to accept if you want to place bets. They try to limit the number of arbitrage bettors, but they do not have any possibilities to stop you from arbitrage betting.

A similar money-generating activity is used when companies are buying products at a cheaper price and selling them somewhere else for a bigger price.

After getting the answer to your question, you could ask yourself the following questions:

Why do people think that arbitrage betting is illegal?

I’ve been in this betting business for several years now. If you are experienced enough and well-informed, you can make enough money from sports betting, you can even do it for a living.

Want to find out how do tipsters make money? read this article

If you are living a socially active life, you meet new people and even make new friends.

In these situations, you get asked very often about your job:

What are you doing for a living?

In these moments you can have an honest answer to this question, or you can lie about it. It is your choice.

In my experience, when I told those people that I’m betting on sports events and I know some loopholes in betting, they thought that I’m doing something illegal.

Why? It is well known that approximately 98% of bettors are at a loss in long run.

Knowing this, it is not surprising that those, who are not familiar with smart betting strategies, think that you are doing something not regular, not legal.

While getting deeper knowledge about arbitrage betting in general, you find out that this activity is based on exploiting the weaknesses of bookmakers.

Generally speaking, exploiting a loophole or weakness of a system or company, does have some consequences.

Those can be banning you from the use of that service or in some cases it can have legal results too. For example, using loopholes in websites, banking systems or in accounting, you can face serious fines and punishments.

Arbitrage betting is a financial activity, that uses a loophole of a company for making guaranteed profits, thus damaging the profitability of the company.

So I think when people are learning about arbitrage betting and about how to bet on both teams and still win, they can easily compare this kind of betting with those mentioned above.

Why do bookmakers limit arbitrage bettors?

A simple way to understand their reason is by inspecting the bookmaker itself. Generally speaking, the goal of bookmakers is the same as the other kind of companies.

Growing the business and making more and more profits are the main target.

Every company has to optimize its workflow in order to maximize profits. At bookmakers, this means that the customers and the bettors have to lose more money than they win.

This means, that those players who are winning in long run are not very welcomed.

Even the simplest bettors who have some knowledge about a sport, have some luck, and win a bigger amount of money, are not welcome in long run.

As a sports bettor, you do not need to use a loophole kind of strategy to be flagged as a “persona non grata” ( “an unwelcome person”).

On the other hand, arbitrage bettors are putting the bookmakers in a spot of guaranteed decrease in profit.

As the bookmakers do not have any legal possibilities to force you to stop your activity as an arber, they are limiting the maximum stakes you can bet on an event.

In order to maximize their profits, bookmakers have developed complex algorithms. Those are filtering out the bettors with smart betting activities like arbitrage betting.

Bookmakers have other tools and tactics too for minimizing their loss on smart bettors. For example, they require various kinds of documents for the verification process, like proof of address or proof of income.

An article that might interest you: arbitrage betting USA

For pieces of information about how to avoid limitations or banned at bookmakers, you can visit this article.

Is sports betting legal?

Arbitrage betting is legal, there are no laws regulating this kind of smart betting activity. On the other hand, sports betting, in general, is not a legal action in every country.

Some countries like North Korea, United Arab Emirates, Singapore, or Cambodia have very strict laws about gambling. They are forbidding gambling, all sports betting activity.

In the USA for example the situation is a little bit different. In a lot of states, sports betting is legalized, but in most of them, it is still forbidden.

The general trend about sports betting is going toward legalization. The majority of states already have at least legislation pending. Some of them already got the approval and they need to put it into action.

In most countries, sports betting is legal, but in a lot of them, the number of bookmakers is limited.

A lot of countries are limiting access for any bookmaker to operate on their grounds, therefore giving an opportunity to local bookmakers only.

In some countries like Hungary for example, the right to operate sports betting activity is the in hands of the state.

There are alternative ways to access bookies even from these restricted areas. Using alternative links or mirror sites is an option. I’m not advising these methods, but for informational purposes, I have to mention them.

Some countries have strict laws regarding sports betting and gambling activity. Also, these can offer foreign bookmakers the chance of buying licenses for offering gambling services.

In summary, I would like to say that if you checked the legality of sports betting in your country, you do not have to be afraid of arbitrage betting. The answer to your question, of whether arbitrage betting is illegal: NO.

If you would like to know more about arbitrage read the following article on where to find arbitrage bets.

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