Glossary
Quant-betting & Cloudbet glossary.
Plain definitions of the concepts behind Glitch Edge's modules — written so you can quote them to a teammate or a journalist.
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arbitrage betting (arb)
What is arbitrage betting?
Arbitrage betting (an arb) is placing bets across multiple bookmakers on all possible outcomes of an event such that the combined return is positive regardless of which outcome occurs. The "edge" comes from price disagreements between books, not from edge against true probability.
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backtest
What is a backtest in sports betting?
A backtest runs a strategy against historical odds + outcomes to estimate how it would have performed in the past. A clean backtest produces P/L, CLV, drawdown, and bet-distribution statistics matching what the strategy would have done if it had run live.
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ball-by-ball cricket modeling
What is ball-by-ball cricket modeling?
Ball-by-ball cricket modeling computes fair prices for in-play markets conditional on the current match state — overs bowled, wickets fallen, target if chasing, batsman in form. The model updates after every delivery, producing fresh probabilities for winner, runs-in-over, top-batter, and other markets.
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bankroll management
What is bankroll management?
Bankroll management is the discipline of sizing bets, capping exposure, and protecting principal across a series of bets so that variance cannot ruin you. The core levers are Kelly fraction, per-bet cap, correlated-exposure cap, and drawdown guardrails.
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Bayesian pricing
What is Bayesian pricing in sports betting?
Bayesian pricing computes a fair probability for an outcome by starting from a prior belief (e.g., 'this team wins X% of the time at home against this opponent strength') and updating it with new evidence (current form, injuries, weather) using Bayes' rule.
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BYOK (bring your own key)
What is BYOK in betting automation?
BYOK (bring your own key) is the operating model where the bettor provides their own bookmaker API key to a third-party automation platform; the platform uses the key to place bets on the bettor's account, but never holds funds.
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closing line value (CLV)
What is closing line value (CLV)?
Closing line value (CLV) is the difference between the odds you got on a bet and the closing odds at the moment the market closed for that event. Positive CLV means you beat the close; negative CLV means the line moved against you.
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Cloudbet
What is Cloudbet?
Cloudbet is a crypto-deposit accepting international sportsbook with a mature v3 API for programmatic bet placement. The platform accepts a broad set of jurisdictions and is competitive on many markets, especially in cricket and esports.
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drawdown
What is drawdown in betting?
Drawdown is the peak-to-trough decline in bankroll over a period. Maximum drawdown is the largest single decline; average drawdown is the typical depth of pullbacks.
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expected value (EV)
What is expected value in sports betting?
Expected value (EV) is the long-run average outcome of a bet, computed as (probability of winning × payout) − (probability of losing × stake). A positive-EV bet wins money on average over many repetitions; a negative-EV bet loses.
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expected vs actual P/L
Why expected P/L differs from actual P/L
Expected P/L is what a strategy should earn on average across many repetitions of the same situation; actual P/L is what it earned in one realization. Variance can push actual P/L far from expected for surprisingly long.
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Kelly criterion
What is the Kelly criterion?
The Kelly criterion is a formula for sizing bets to maximize the long-run growth rate of a bankroll. For a bet with probability *p* of winning at decimal odds *o*, full-Kelly size is (p × o − 1) / (o − 1) as a fraction of bankroll.
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Kelly fraction
What is fractional Kelly?
Fractional Kelly is sizing each bet at a constant multiple (less than 1) of the full Kelly recommendation — typically 0.25× or 0.5× — to reduce variance at the cost of some long-run growth.
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lineup-aware pricing (NBA)
What is lineup-aware NBA pricing?
Lineup-aware pricing computes NBA fair prices conditional on the starting lineup (and in-game substitution patterns) rather than treating the team as a fixed unit. Rest schedule, injuries, and historical lineup performance feed into the win probability.
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market making
What is market making in betting?
Market making is the practice of posting both sides of a market — bid and ask — and earning the spread (or losing on adverse selection). Bookmakers are market makers by definition; some sharp operators market-make on exchanges like Smarkets or Betfair.
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paper trading (paper betting)
What is paper trading in sports betting?
Paper trading (paper betting) is running a strategy against live odds without placing real money. The platform records what the bet would have been, what it would have paid, and what the closing line looked like — but no capital changes hands.
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Polymarket
What is Polymarket?
Polymarket is a decentralized prediction market built on Polygon (Ethereum L2) where users trade outcome shares for real-world events at prices that reflect crowd-sourced probability estimates. Outcomes settle on-chain via UMA optimistic oracle.
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sharp line
What is a sharp line?
A sharp line is a market price that reflects efficient information — typically posted by a low-vig book that accepts large sharp money (Pinnacle, Cloudbet, Sportmarket). Sharp lines tend to be the reference point against which other books' lines are evaluated.
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value betting
What is value betting?
Value betting is placing bets where your estimated probability of winning is higher than the market's implied probability after vig — i.e., the bet has positive expected value against the model's estimate, not against another book's price.
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vig (juice)
What is vig in sports betting?
Vig (also "juice" or "overround") is the implied bookmaker margin baked into market prices — the amount by which the market's implied probabilities sum to more than 100%. A two-way market with 110/110 American odds carries about 4.5% vig.