2009

[peterbirks]

I'll get some form of graphs and tables up, although it will be a mess.





Party in 2009:






Stars in 2009



Pacific in 2009



50c-$1 NL/PL 2009



$1-$2 NL/PL 2009



A major cause of the downswing in November was due to me suddenly running bad at $1-$2. People think of running bad as being a sequence of bad beats, but it isn't like that. The thing is, at NL, you will often be in against short-to-medium stacks on the turn when you will be 30% to 40%. You haven't done anything wrong to get to that position (most of the time you have taken the hand down either PF, on the flop or with your bet on the turn) but you are in the situation of "I'd rather not be here, but now that I am here, folding is worse than calling". If you lose eight or nine of these on the spin, plus you never hit a suck-out, plus you get one or two big suck-outs against you, then, bang, you've lost seven or eight buy ins compared to EV.

In my case, this was how the downswing started, and then it got to running bad as well (where you get to a bad position and folding is better than calling). Your EV line starts to flow down in sympathy with your actual results line. Experienced players will know the situation all too well.


$2-$4 NL 2009



All Birks



Year on Year comparison




The $3k or thereabouts downswing, which kind of started on October 10th and which really kicked in in November, was not a pleasant experience. I adopted my normal strategy. Keep playing, try to rock up and do nothing speculative, and move down in stakes. And, as predicted, the recovery took the path of

(a) slow the decline (rocking up, moving down in stakes, bad luck continues)
(b) begin a slow recovery (rocking up, lower stakes, bad luck has ended)
(c) gradually accelerate reciovery as confidence rebuilds (slightly less rocky, a little bit of higher stakes play)
(d) resume previous win rate (full recovery of confidence, back to standard playing style, more play at normal stakes).

Despite a net $2k loss in November, wins of $3k in the first 10 days of October and $4.5k in December (mainly down to heavy volume rather than a higher win rate) pushed me to $5.5k for Q4, with which I was delighted. That made the four quarters roughly $9k, $1.5k, $9k and $5.5k. I haven't included the gratis hotel in Monte Carlo or the €10k entrance to the EPT in my winnings, mainly through laziness (and the fact that I lost the €10k back fairly promptly).

I'm still not absolutely certain that I can beat $1-$2 (particularly on Stars) once the regs suss out my playing style. Paradoxically, I'm more confident at $2-$4 on Party and (when I get the nerve to attack it) $5-$10 on Party, where I feel "in tune" with the regulars and where you get the occasional single-tabling fish who likes to gamble. As for Pacific, well, I really think I could beat just about any full ring game that starts up there, but the software is so horrible (and the speed of play so slow) that it has to be ruled out as the main source of income.

The dream, at the moment, is to crack $2-$4 NL on Stars as well as Party. But at the moment I'm trying to re-establish myself as a $1-$ NL player. Hard to remember that one weekend in early October I played exclusively $2-$4 one weekend when I was on Party (sticking to $1-$2 on Stars). You have to be able to shrug your shoulders at $2k swings in a day if you are four-tabling $2-$4 and 6-tabling $1-$2, and I realized that I wasn't yet in a shoulder-shrugging frame of mind. It will come, but I probably need a six-figure bankroll (i.e., sitting in the various sites and on Neteller) to be able to do it.


Summary

Position	Hands	$	bb/100	VPIP%	PFR%	3Bet%	WTSD%	W$SD%	Agg	Agg%	Std Dev bb
1) small blind	32815	($12,809.83)	-25.79	18.8	7.7	3.8	20.8	52.6	5.93	38.9	54.33
2) big blind	32812	($23,173.85)	-44.25	9.6	4.4	4.4	18.4	49.3	5.21	29.1	62.22
3) early	84796	$12,873.52	9.69	9.2	8.8	2.4	24.9	57.3	6.3	51.8	45.76
4) middle	67691	$15,413.08	15.49	11.4	10.6	2.7	24	57.9	5.04	45.1	53.58
5) cutoff	35499	$8,942.92	17.43	13	11.2	3.4	21.5	52.4	4.92	40.2	56.28
6) button	33058	$15,555.69	28.77	20.4	12	4	21.2	53.6	3.77	40.1	65.31
TOTAL	286671	$16,801.53	3.98	12.7	9.3	3.6	21.2	53.4	5.12	38.8	56.25

		STAKE
SITE	Data	BONUS	$50	$100	$200	RAKEBACK	$400	$10	Tournament	$600	Grand Total
PTY	Sum of Win	$2,939	-$196	$4,355	$2,132	$1,066	$2,171			$56	$12,523
	Sum of Hands	0	991	66,007	64,036	0	8,301			77	139,412
Pacific	Sum of Win	$225	-$38	$1,654	$2,061	$760	-$114			$117	$4,665
	Sum of Hands	0	1,184	41,190	10,516	0	1,037			12	53,939
Littlewoods	Sum of Win	$142		$2,269	$261	$20	-$6				$2,686
	Sum of Hands	0		15,832	1,398	0	5				17,235
Stars	Sum of Win	$890		-$165	$2,344	$857	-$143		$1,339		$5,122
	Sum of Hands	0		27,919	40,611	0	307		1,860		70,697
UB	Sum of Win	$25						-$17			$8
	Sum of Hands	0						432			432
FTP	Sum of Win	$760		$161							$921
	Sum of Hands	0		5,972							5,972
Noble	Sum of Win	$41						-$2	-$4		$35
	Sum of Hands	0						243	50		293
Total Sum of Win		$5,022	-$234	$8,274	$6,798	$2,703	$1,908	-$19	$1,335	$173	$25,960
Total Sum of Hands		0	2,175	156,920	116,561	0	9,650	675	1,910	89	287,980

+++++++++++

(Later);

Every so often Warren Buffett just cuts through the crap and nails a company's directors so firmly to the wall that it's a wonder any of them ever move again.

This time it's Kraft, in which Berkshire Hathaway owns a 9% stake, that is at the receiving end of an attack so blisteringly logical that if I were a Kraft director I would kill myself now.

Kraft, in a move that didn't look all that controversial, asked for permission to issue up to 370m shares to finance a paper bid for Cadbury. Berkshire said that it would be voting against this. But what was interesting was the superb justification it used:

What we know with certainty, however, is that Kraft stock, at its current price of $27, is a very expensive "currency" to be used in an acquisition. In 2007, in fact, Kraft spent $3.6 billion to repurchase shares at about $33 per share, presumably because the directors and management thought the shares to be worth more.

Does the board now believe those purchases were a mistake and that Kraft's true value is only the current price of $27 per share -- and that it is therefore fine to structure a major acquisition based upon that price? Would the directors use stock as merger currency if the price were, say, $20 per share? Surely the true business value of what is given is as important as the true business value of what is received when an acquisition is being evaluated. We hope all shareholders will use this yardstick in deciding how to vote.

As Eric Morecambe might have said, "Get out of that". Using paper to finance deals is very popular amongst senior executives -- it makes their company bigger (equals higher salaries) and doesn't involve onerous things like interest payments. But Berkshire has highlighted a fantastic contradiction, one that I suspect will be used many more times over the next few years. "Why are you valuing your stock at '$x' for this takeover when you valued it at '$x times 1.5' only a year ago when you were repurchasing shares?"

This goes to the heart of the stockmarket. Just because your stock was trading at $33 last year and is trading at $27 today, that does not change the underlying value of the company. And any share repurchase (reducing the amount of stock in issue) or paper-based takeover (increasing the amount of stock in issue) implies that you believe the stock to be in fundamental terms to be worth more than you are paying when you are repurchasing, or worth less than you are issuing when you are buying another company.

In reality, companies repurchase shares when they have nothing else to do with their spare money, and make paper-based takeovers when the market is depressed, because the acquired company looks "cheap". The flaw in this argument is that a company is only "cheap" if you are paying cash. If your own shares are also depressed, the "cheapness" is a complete illusion.

It would be more logical to use your paper to make what look like pricy purchases (because your own paper is overvalued, while the takeover target is presumably less overvalued) when the market is high, and to repurchase your stock when the market is low. Indeed, if capital rules allowed it, in times of recession it would make sense to borrow money from banks to buy back shares.

________________

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Re: Kraft - don't plagiarise Robert Peston or whoever else.

Re: Your "winnings" - ever thought of working a little harder in the office? What a waste of a life.

[(Anonymous)]

Hmmm.

Re: Kraft - I think it's pretty clear that Birks knows what he's talking about in these fields and doesn't need to plaigarise.

Re: Your "winnings" - Some of us, self included, look at this blog regularly for comments on poker and business and find value in both. An end of year summary seems in order. I'd say that you reading this blog in order to post such a comment is good evidence that you're more fucked up than the author.

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

I've just looked to see what Peston has written on this -- my only reaction was to the Berkshire press release, but it's unsurprising that Peston would also see it as a nuclear bomb for the the Kraft management. It did fair leap off the page, as they say. Touching, though, to see that Peston's blog is timed 17.14. I wrote my bit (and posted it) before I left work, so I would make that about 14.35. I say this just in case by some miracle any readers took such accusations seriously -- I always attribute sources, but in this case the witterings were all my own...

PJ

Hear Hear

[(Anonymous)]

Just to second this, whilst reading through Birks' summary the thought occurred to me that I've been reading (and enjoying) this blog since the times when he was playing almost exclusively limit poker online. And given that that really wasn't such a long time ago, the posted NL results are massively impressive, at least they are to me, someone whose NL "career" was shorter and considerably less successful.

I read the business stuff too, but I'm glad I don't have to pretend I understand any of it. Arguably this particular post is the only one that I've come anywhere near getting the point of.

Anyway, good year PB. Keep up the good poker, and please keep up the great blogging.

Re: Hear Hear

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Thank you sir (or madam, but I'm guessing it's sir).

In case you are interested in how time travels faster as you grow older, I shifted from Limit to No Limit in April 2007, so I've now been playing NL cash for 2.75 years.

PJ

[(Anonymous)]

You're a very naughty boy, aren't you, JB?

[(Anonymous)]

The results are really interesting. I hadn't clocked quite how different your strategy is from what could be called a 2+2 norm (these are 6 max results, right?). I also recall a podcast interview in which the 2+2er/live cash player Limon suggested that the right way to play no-ante cash NL games is very tight and patient, boringly so in fact. It surprises me given that, if anything, the 2+2 angle seems to get laggier by the year.

Re: the finance, the majority of mainstream financial reporting is generally laughably shallow in my experience, and the idea of an analysis based on a thorough understanding of ROE would be quite refreshing. What I could find from Robert Peston on the subject was average, i would say.

Overall I think it's striking how much business leaders manage to get away with actions that are demonstrably and axiomatically wrong, even before uncertainty comes into play. Also, I think that the parallel to poker is interesting, since i think that there are ideas such as results-orientedness and sample size which are second nature to poker players which the business/finance world just seems willfully ignorant of.

ian

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Hi Ian:

No, they are full ring. They would indeed be tight for 6-max! Hold Em Manager just arbitrarily divides things into six categories. As you can see "Early" and "Middle" have considerably more hands represented.

That said, I have got views on 6-max which are different from what I know of 2+2dom. To be honest, I try to steer clear of 2+2 group think mainly by not reading it. I just see how people play and adapt accordingly.

As I've written before, many apparently plain statements about the "right" thing to do have implicit assumptions, and if you fail to spot those implicit assumptions then you get into trouble when the implicit assumptions stop being true. To take one trite example, the apparently sensible line of "you have to make people pay to draw" contains two assumptions, one metagame and one hand-by hand. The hand-by-hand one is in fact a debate about "deny implied odds and call down to the end if they call" vs "offer implied odds, but fold often enough to make opponent's call not worthwhile". The metagame assumption is that the person doing the betting usually has the hand and the person doing the calling usually has the draw -- which is not necessarily the case the way I play.

Recently I've spotted some subtle changes to short-stack styles, but I think 2+2 land still thinks most short-stackers are still playing the way that they did this time last year.

PJ

[jiggery-pokery.livejournal.com]

F'n A, Pete. f'n A. :-)

I was comparing this year's result with last year's (http://peterbirks.livejournal.com/338380.html); last year you wrote:

No specific targets yet for 2009. I think that I would be happy to maintain this year's win level, which is a significant jump from earlier performances. My long-term aim remains an average 20% increase in earnings per annum, and this year's 80% jump is probably a bit of an outlier.

And this year you jumped another 60% from even last year! Are you setting yourself targets for 2010, other than to keep developing confidence at $1-$2 everywhere and higher in some places?

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Hi Chris! Yes, I remember writing that.
I had thought of setting a high target for this year, but then I assessed things a bit more rationally.
1) Much of my increased earn is from increased volume. My per hand rate has gone up about 25% a year. I'm just playing more often and more tables. That in itself is an improvement, but it's also something important to bear in mind.
2) If I increase my volume just a bit, I think that an average of $3k a month is possible, (say, 40% to 50% chance). That would entail 360k hands in the year at an average of $10 a hundred. Both are quite a big ask, but are doable.
3) To go higher than $36k for the year would require a quantum leap. I would need to play higher stakes (significantly so), 4-tabling rather than 6-tabling, serious focus while playing (and afterwards with player analysis) and serious table selection. In other words, proper professional play rather than the semi-pro pissing around that I'm doing at the moment.

I'm not ready for that this year and I probably won't be ready for it next year. I may never be ready for it. I don't plan to head down the Clarkatroid route of 10-tabling at $3-$6 NL for a million hands a year. I have no prejudice against it. In fact I admire it. But I'm just not made to do it. I would hate it very very quickly, I think.

So, yes, try to get as relaxed at $1-$2 as I currently am at 50c-$1. Try to beat those games for very nearly as much in terms of big bets per 100. Get in some decent volume at $2-$4 on Party (say, 10% of all hands played this year) and try to get about 10,000 hands in at a higher level - $3-$6 FR if I can. Keep my Palladium level on Party, and try to keep my Supernova on Stars. The second will be tougher than the first.

Also, learn some mixed games. Or, rather, learn to play them properly. After all, I was brought up on Dealer's Choice! Badugi, Razz, Triple Draw. No interest in high-low however.

PJ

[jiggery-pokery.livejournal.com]

I don't really remember you using the dread word "professional" in the context of your own play before! As you say, you imagine that you would hate increasing your play volume by a factor of four, though you imply that you are prepared to increase it to some extent. There does appear to be plenty of room for you to grow within the ecology, stake level by stake level.

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

Well, when you start playing because you feel you "have to", rather than because you want to, there is no way but to accept the "professional" tag. It's all the fault of the accumulative rakeback system! Well, that and the fact that I want to clear my mortgage....

PJ

[jiggery-pokery.livejournal.com]

This raises the question as to whether you would keep chasing the bonuses if the criteria were made harder still. You're not going to make Supernova Elite on Stars with 70,000 hands a year there, even if you're playing immense limits. (Or perhaps you might - I can't remember the specifics, but I doubt it.) If Stars ramped up the requirements of Supernova, or introduced a more lucrative but monthly-assessed Supernova Plus A Bit But Not Elite level, would you go for it? (I'm guessing not, by virtue of your having taken tournaments back up, which may be better value in terms of taking less rake per unit time, but generate much less rakeback per unit time.)

[peterbirks.livejournal.com]

The touneys are just a bit of fun ... absolutely not worth it in any hourly rate! Will go back to regular cash all the time next month.

The question about rakeback-bonuses is a tough one. I know that I should just be focusing on the cash, with rakeback as a nice bonus, but the marginal rate and structure makes it darned hard to ignore it! As it happens, I am ignorning the Party "ten best days" bonus this month, or at least I am until we get closer to the end of the month.

I really don't know whether Supernova is worth making the effort to keep; but it would be much easier at higher stakes, so I reckon it's worth putting in the extra volume at the lower stakes for a month or two. But I wouldn't do so long-term.

PJ