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The High Tech Trifecta
They've got multimillion-dollar bankrolls, lightning-fast networks, and a probability-crunching system that leaves the odds in the dust. Meet the pari-mutuel fund managers who are redefining horse racing.
By Michael Kaplan
Crisscrossing telephone wires snake along the carpeting of Rod Dufficy's cluttered home office near Hong Kong's Happy Valley racetrack. Dressed down in baggy black velour sweatpants and a matching gym shirt, Dufficy, 32, sits at a large L-shaped desk, rocking back in his chair and eyeing three computer screens crowded with numbers. He is cramming for a race that begins in 22 minutes, calling up information from an online database and sifting it through a betting-analysis program built into his system. The Australian is one of Hong Kong's elite breed of super-successful professional gamblers, computer-assisted horse bettors who work in teams and net millions at the races each year. Tonight, however, is not one of Dufficy's big-money sessions; he is down US$300,000 heading into this race. "I'm going to have a lot of outlay on this next one," he says. "Maybe $550,000."
Three slender Hong Kong sisters face Dufficy, waiting for a printer to spit out a list of a couple hundred bets with potentially big payoffs. One sister grabs the sheets and snips them into strips, which she distributes to the other women. They punch the information into their handheld wagering machines, which transmit it to the track via telephone lines, filling the room with the chirping of outgoing data.
Four minutes and three-quarters of a mile later, Dufficy looks up at a large-screen TV and watches thoroughbreds lunging past the finish line. He scrutinizes a fistful of papers, then scans the race results scrolling across his desktop monitor. "We've got wins - quinellas and a tierce," he says calmly, referring to wagers that required selecting the first two and three finishers. He made $330,000 on this single race. "It'll put me ahead by $30,000 tonight," he says. By week's end, his earnings will add up to a profit of about $130,000 for essentially two days of work - a typical cycle for Dufficy, who, in fact, wagers and wins less than some other computer-assisted bettors in town.
But there's plenty of dough to go around. As Dufficy and members of the half-dozen or so computer teams in Hong Kong will tell you, this city stands as the land of opportunity for tech-inclined handicappers. The allure centers on Hong Kong's massive handle - the total amount of money wagered on each race - which is the highest in the world. It allows the teams to lay hundreds of thousands of dollars on a single race without upsetting the odds. But Hong Kong racing has other attractions as well: Run by the not-for-profit Hong Kong Jockey Club, it is scrupulously honest (fixing would hurt computer bettors' calculations), and there is a pool of only 1,200 horses per season (a manageable number for the teams to track performances). Then there are the extravagantly exotic bets and parlays, comprising a rich smorgasbord of financial opportunities that seems custom-made for the computer teams. One, the Triple Trio, requires picking the top three finishers in three races and routinely pays six-figure dividends.
"Racing is becoming more and more like a stock market model," says one insider. Horses should be thought of as Dell or Microsoft - their past performances are the equivalent of economic charts.
They've got multimillion-dollar bankrolls, lightning-fast networks, and a probability-crunching system that leaves the odds in the dust. Meet the pari-mutuel fund managers who are redefining horse racing.
By Michael Kaplan
Crisscrossing telephone wires snake along the carpeting of Rod Dufficy's cluttered home office near Hong Kong's Happy Valley racetrack. Dressed down in baggy black velour sweatpants and a matching gym shirt, Dufficy, 32, sits at a large L-shaped desk, rocking back in his chair and eyeing three computer screens crowded with numbers. He is cramming for a race that begins in 22 minutes, calling up information from an online database and sifting it through a betting-analysis program built into his system. The Australian is one of Hong Kong's elite breed of super-successful professional gamblers, computer-assisted horse bettors who work in teams and net millions at the races each year. Tonight, however, is not one of Dufficy's big-money sessions; he is down US$300,000 heading into this race. "I'm going to have a lot of outlay on this next one," he says. "Maybe $550,000."
Three slender Hong Kong sisters face Dufficy, waiting for a printer to spit out a list of a couple hundred bets with potentially big payoffs. One sister grabs the sheets and snips them into strips, which she distributes to the other women. They punch the information into their handheld wagering machines, which transmit it to the track via telephone lines, filling the room with the chirping of outgoing data.
Four minutes and three-quarters of a mile later, Dufficy looks up at a large-screen TV and watches thoroughbreds lunging past the finish line. He scrutinizes a fistful of papers, then scans the race results scrolling across his desktop monitor. "We've got wins - quinellas and a tierce," he says calmly, referring to wagers that required selecting the first two and three finishers. He made $330,000 on this single race. "It'll put me ahead by $30,000 tonight," he says. By week's end, his earnings will add up to a profit of about $130,000 for essentially two days of work - a typical cycle for Dufficy, who, in fact, wagers and wins less than some other computer-assisted bettors in town.
But there's plenty of dough to go around. As Dufficy and members of the half-dozen or so computer teams in Hong Kong will tell you, this city stands as the land of opportunity for tech-inclined handicappers. The allure centers on Hong Kong's massive handle - the total amount of money wagered on each race - which is the highest in the world. It allows the teams to lay hundreds of thousands of dollars on a single race without upsetting the odds. But Hong Kong racing has other attractions as well: Run by the not-for-profit Hong Kong Jockey Club, it is scrupulously honest (fixing would hurt computer bettors' calculations), and there is a pool of only 1,200 horses per season (a manageable number for the teams to track performances). Then there are the extravagantly exotic bets and parlays, comprising a rich smorgasbord of financial opportunities that seems custom-made for the computer teams. One, the Triple Trio, requires picking the top three finishers in three races and routinely pays six-figure dividends.
"Racing is becoming more and more like a stock market model," says one insider. Horses should be thought of as Dell or Microsoft - their past performances are the equivalent of economic charts.