Last Updated on December 21, 2020
Bankroll management is one of the most frequently asked questions from both newbies and “experienced” bettors. It has also a very simple answer but some people don’t believe it unless they see it so we decided to collect some data and show you the numbers, so you can see in a graphic the differences between the most common approaches.
What stake size should i use when placing bets?
There are many options when it comes to staking size, however not all of them are successful and some are more successful than others.
The five most common are:
A – Bet it all
B – Martingale
C – Fixed amount
D – Proportional betting
E – Fibonacci
Let’s first explain what each one means
Bet it all
This “strategy” involves betting your entire balance on every single bet. The winning can be big but it’s usually a very bad idea. The number of people who still use this method is big but fortunately is decreasing.
Martingale
This strategy involves doubling your stake on every losing bet. For example, you start with a 1$ stake, if you loose you bet $2 the next time, $4 the next one and so on until you win.
This is the most common strategy on the roulettes and lots of people use it when placing sports bets. It’s necessary to have a big bankroll and usually is not a very good idea.
Fixed amount
This is a fairly good strategy, it involves deciding a prefixed stake and sticking to it all the time. It has the advantage of preventing compulsive behavior but it’s not the most profitable one.
Proportional betting
This method involves betting a fixed percentage of the available balance, usually around 5%. This is probably the most profitable method as you can see in our simulations below.
Fibonacci
This method is similar to Martingale but instead of doubling on every single loosing bet, we follow a Fibonacci sequence, for example, $1 $1 $2 $3 $5 etc…
As you can see this method isn’t also a very good idea.
The results of our simulations
We keep score of every bet placed and generated these results based on 575 bets placed in approximately one year.
There is no point in going into many details on the numbers, i believe a simple graph shows it all.
As you can see, fixed staking or proportional staking are the best ideas when it comes to bankroll management.
Bankroll management is only part of the equation
Don’t forget that bankroll management is only a part of the equation and you should also think about betting strategies.
Keep in mind that most bookmakers start limiting your stakes once you become a regular winner and in the long run you might have to shift to a more advanced aproach and use exchanges or bookies like pinnacle. We personally use a blend of proportional and fixed but if you stick with either option you should be fine.
