Secrets of Winning Baccarat

However in good shoes. 7 or more ties per shoe(Because I play ties) I have found that if you use the methods in this book. It costs you money on good shoes in mini-baccarat. Now if you have good money management skills. (aka. quit while ahead.) And know what you are doing, but would like some help getting through bad shoes, purchase this book. If you are looking for a book to start learning the game. Look elsewhere.


Worthless baccarat book   December 6, 2003
Seeker (East Coast, USA)
25 out of 25 found this review helpful

The author recorded the results of each hand for 232 shoes and concocted a system that would work against that set of results. He doesn't recognize that anything can happen in such a small sample. For example, he reports that, in his 232 shoes, the Player hand won 50.8% of the non-tied hands. In the long run, of course, the Player wins less than 50% of the non-tied hands. Otherwise, anyone could win at baccarat just by betting Player all the time. This is why serious analysts use computer simulations to study samples of literally millions of hands.

The author's basic method is an up-as-you-lose progression. Any such system will indeed tend to win more often than it loses, because it wins large bets that recoup earlier small losses. The catch is that, when the large bets lose, then the system loses big. The few big losses will offset the many smaller wins. The net result, over the long run, will be in keeping with the game's underlying math -- which, in baccarat, means that the bettor will lose about one percent of the total amount bet. Therefore, this author's claim that his system will win two-thirds of all shoes is plausible. Unfortunately, the long-run result will be the same as that of a player who didn't bother to record hand results and just bet the same amount every hand -- i.e., a net loss.

The author states, correctly, that the odds on each hand are the same regardless of the results of the preceding hands. Nevertheless, he advises betting that streaks won't continue. He doesn't explain this inconsistency. (There's actually an extremely slight interdependence among successive hands, so that streaks are very slightly more likely to end than to continue, but the author doesn't discuss this phenomenon and correctly doesn't rely on it. It's far too small to meaningfully reduce the house edge.)

The author's expertise is said to be in the construction of mathematical models. His error here is to construct a model based on very limited data. As the saying goes, "Garbage in, garbage out."