I am still working my way through the nuts and bolts of the announcements but my early thoughts are that if this had been announced pre covid and pre the Matching Engine we would have all patted them on the back and said how wonderful it is.

No more traders would be whinging about goalkeepers being worthless
Small dividend increase would have been welcomed
Team of the month would have been hailed as a great addition promoting both long term holds and short term trading so ticking everybody's boxes.

However Covid and the Matching Engine have changed everything and maybe a simple larger increase to PB across the board would have satisfied the majority of traders more.

I personally think by January we will be crying out for an interim increase to dividends as prices will have increased to the point where there value is much lower or another share split will be required. My reasoning for this is simply that the product in its finished state will attract many new users (Big Marketing push to come) who will think making 20% a year in the current climate is great especially as it will seem more fun with the additional ways of winning.

I think it will be similar to the last 57% increase but with a little smoke and mirrors

With so much football to be played over the next few years there is hardly going to be any media buzz only days so look for some of the increase to be on triple media days as there will be hardly any of those!

@Erased-Citizen

I have looked back on some of your previous posts and like other replies here I think you need to be more patient. Unless you are super lucky you can never always be holding the players the are in favour. Your post says you topped up on Gnabry when he was flying but often that is the worse time to buy shares as you have missed the spike and generally bought at the peak.

Try to focus on your players and why you bought them - Rashford is a great player for United and England and cannot win PB/MB every week but throughout the next 18 months will win several amounts of dividends and will have a spell of performances which will drive his price up. He is very likely to be a regular starter for England so will see his price explode around the Euros.

As for not winning much in dividends your original portfolio was set up with lower priced players for Capital appreciation so if you have just started buying the bigger names it is obvious that you should not have won many dividends.

Additionally if you keep re jigging your portfolio and selling via ME you will erode your funds you have to wait for the right opportunities and with 2 years of continuous football on its way most players will have there exit points.

My suggestion would be to eventually have 75% of your portfolio in medium/long term holds and the remainder in short term holds as you seem to have the need to chase current trends. This is not been critical of you it is an observation of how you have traded so far and how you react on occasions.

I also hope you are feeling better and remember there are those of us on here with significant sums invested that still miss out on winning PB/MB or do not hold the days/weeks biggest gainer but we do not go changing our plans because of it.

@Baydog

That is so right, when Betfair first launched there were bargains galore with people either prepared to overpay for bets or people who would lay odds that were far too generous but after a while the horse racing and football odds now just mirror bookmakers with maybe an additional 0.1% of benefit to the punter.

I really do expect it eventually be the same here with very small margins, therefore buying now at bit % drops on the market price and no 2% commission will look like taking a candy from a baby in 12-18 months

I was sat very comfortably having bought the big time Charlie's 2 years ago when I joined and quickly doubled the original 20k and then took my 20k back roughly 6 months ago so just playing with profit. The portfolio was back to 35k yesterday and the plan was to take another 20k out when it reached 40k.

However I just see far too much opportunity to buy players so cheaply via ME that I believe by October will be substantially higher due to the dividend increase and growth of the platform that I dumped a significant amount in last night in addition to selling 50 shares each across my big hitters to enable me to buy masses of shares in the 40p to £2 players. I think we have a very narrow window of opportunity as I think once the new dividend table is announced the ability to buy on the cheap my disappear.

I am hoping to add 50% between now and November 1st minimum, however I will have to adopt a more active approach and spend several hours on the platform but expect to make in excess of £50,000 over this period of time.

@Baydog

I feel the same just deposited some serious cash and now have bids in on over 30 players.

I just cannot see how the upcoming dividend increases will not be substantial if they are to last 12 months and think they will also be followed by a massive marketing push prior to the start of 20/21 season and maybe a deposit bonus in September.

If spreads then tighten with the introduction of full order books we could make a tidy profit in the next 4 months

@Sol

Personally I think we are over estimating what changes will come, I think they will resolve the obvious errors within the current system especially where a player seems to get 4 stories from the same source.

However I do not see very many overseas sources being added yet, they will want to rectify all the errors with the current media outlets first then maybe add 1 source from each of the other main leagues to start with and see how easy it is to manage and to see if there is a massive backlash from traders if it turns out to be farcical.

I have to say that if they were in the future to launch the product with a stand alone German version using the technology of Nasdaq and firstly questioned the German public if they wanted media based upon German or European press my bet would be that they would prefer German press only.

Our problem is that currently it is a mess, if they sort it out I do not think there would be a need for European sources.

@Dan-The-Man

I think the main issue to do this now would be liquidity. We are just getting over the instant sell issue and there are still players with no get out price at all.

Imagine adding all those players from lesser leagues I cannot imagine market makers would be keen to offer prices on all the nondescript players throughout those leagues.

However when they have the current new system in place and working well it is definitely something they could look at then.

@Dan-The-Man

If they do not go with a home grown player would expect them to buy big as without a solid back four behind all there attacking players they will be in trouble against the best teams in Europe

I prefer Marquinhos to both of them - plays in farmers league for the most dominant team splits time between centre half and defensive midfield and will always have a good run in Champions League and seems very cheap at current price.