BetAngel is now offering co-located servers for trading on Betfair and BetDAQ. This is a new service and not related to the original VPS that they offered. The servers are not as close to the exchanges as in financial trading (where the distance between exchange and trader servers is measured in metres) but as close as Betfair will allow you to get.
Already, BetAngel have reported denial of service attacks on the servers (see here) to deny or slowdown the service. The chief suspects being those who wish to protect their preeminence on the exchange. In the past I have reported on Betfair's use of their own traders and bots to increase profits and that Betfair's exchange is probably a dark pool. Low-latency activity by sophisticated bots leads one to believe that the playing field is not level for all participants.
Maybe it is time for tighter regulation of betting exchanges to ensure that the public are getting a fair deal. I am keen to move my own bots closer to Betfair's data centre. However, after reading of the problems that BetAngel are having, I would locate my bots to servers that are not advertised as being dedicated to giving the fastest access to Betfair.
Still, I wouldn't put it past an exchange to have a team of people logging access times and running a bespoke attack on an IP address, no matter where you are located. More so than ever, as with the financial markets, making money from sports betting has less to do with sport and more to do with market structure and taking advantage of it.
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