BetMoose Review

BetMoose is not your usual online bitcoin gambling site. It’s not just about wagering on different games or sports events. It’s a highly interesting concept that is bound to catch the attention of anyone interested in placing bets online. It is being promoted as a site for “Peer-to-peer bets and predictions. Created by anyone, about anything.”

On this betting site, anyone can create a “futures contract” with their unilaterally decided proposed terms. A betting deadline is set by the host, along with the waiting period. There is no dice or other gambling paraphernalia involved. It’s all about real world events. It’s basically like converting predictions into monies.

BetMoose merely serves as a support infrastructure for distributed contract exchange. What this means is that there’s a multitude of bet hosts who resolve their own bets. There are many individuals independently hosting their own games and determining the outcomes by their own terms. What BetMoose merely does is to serve as a fail-safe to prevent instances of cheating.

BetMoose, as a predictions market, can be quite complicated for those who like to do some scientific analyses and calculations to be able to make educated predictions. However, it isn’t necessarily complicated but largely exciting for those who simply want to enjoy the idea of winning something by accurately predicting some future event or outcome.

There have been a number of ventures similar to BetMoose in the past but most of them failed to turn into success stories because of the lack of traffic or participants. Predictions markets or P2P bets-and-predictions sites like BetMoose do well when there are people participating but they quickly fall apart as participants turn scarce. BetMoose, apparently, has addressed the issue of the lack of traffic or participants by harnessing the power of bitcoins. It’s very difficult for sites like BetMoose to convince people to place bets and get charged by the bet hosts for commissions through credit cards or bank transfers. BetMoose, it seems, has found a viable solution to address the drawbacks of predictions markets or peer-to-peer betting sites.

We have to admit we are taking an optimistic point of view as we do this BetMoose review. It’s necessarily a bias towards this online gambling site. It’s more of a positive perspective since we are pleased with the concept of BetMoose. Nevertheless, we will surely point out things that we find worth criticizing as we encounter them.

Registration

Signing up for a Betmoose account is a short is a short process. You will only be asked for basic details such as your email address, your preferred username, password, country, and bitcoin address. If you don’t have a bitcoin address yet, you may skip the field for the bitcoin address. You may add your bitcoin address later on, as you access your account dashboard. Click on the green Done button and go to your email account to click on the verification link, and you’re all set. The whole process should take you only around 10 to 15 seconds. In our test, the verification email arrived promptly so we were able to complete the account registration very quickly.

The BetMoose Account User Interface

The BetMoose account dashboard enables changes in the site’s time zone and the country reflected. It also allows players to hide their names from the Hall of Fame and to force anonymous betting. Additionally, it enables the management of withdrawal addresses and the changing of email addresses and passwords.

Since this is not similar to an online casino, the dashboard naturally does not include sections for making deposits and managing bonuses. The functions provided are different but are still very easy to understand. What we just didn’t immediately grasp was the “Ad Clef to Login” part. Not many online gambling enthusiasts may know this advanced two-factor authentication system so it would have helped if BetMoose included a short note as to what Clef is all about. Better yet, they could have just indicated it as “Add Two-Factor Authentication” to be easier to understand. Yes, this is nitpicking but we would just like to mention it since it took a few minutes of our time to figure out.

The account dashboard includes the options for placing and hosting bets. These are accessed by hovering the mouse pointer over your username.

BetMoose’s Parimutuel and Fixed Odds Betting

So what really is BetMoose all about? What kind of game is it offering?

As already mentioned earlier, BetMoose allows anyone to host bets under their own terms. These bets can be any of the following types: Parimutuel Betting and Fixed Odds Betting.

In parimutuel betting, the odds can change. It is the exact opposite of fixed-odds betting wherein bettors have to lock in the odds. The calculation for the winnings is hence simple. For instance, if you bet 1 BTC on Yes and you choose the 2.50x odd, you will get 2.5 BTC if you win.  For pari-mutuel betting, the payout is computed as the sum of the bet placed and the product of the total volume to be split among winners and the weighted bet over the total weighted volume on the player’s side.

Here’s the formula:

Payout = 97% {(Bet Amount Placed) + [(Weighted Bet/Total Volume on the Player’s Side) x (Total Volume to Be Split among Winners)]}

The weighted bet is the Bet Amount Placed times the time-multiplier. There’s a 97% multiplier here because 3% is deducted from the gross payout as a fee or commission for the bet host and BetMoose.

The image above is an example of parimutuel bet. As shown, the current time weight multiplier is a number indicated on the bet. Any player should be able to make sense of the formula indicated above. The numbers needed to compute the payout are all found easily accessible.

Anyone can host a bet. Once created, a bet becomes instantly available for other players to place their bets on. A “Decision Logic” needs to be added to each bet to ascertain the resolution, to provide a clear and verifiable basis for the resolution of bets. The bets can be edited but only for the description and picture. Other changes need the approval of a BetMoose moderator. The outcome scenarios of the bets, however, can never be changed. If there are complaints regarding the resolution of bets, BetMoose can intervene. However, these complaints should be promptly reported (within 24 hours) to be properly addressed.

Bets that are not resolved by the host within 24 hours are automatically forwarded to BetMoose. It will be BetMoose then that will take charge of the resolution of the bet based on the Decision Logic indicated.

There are instances when a bet is resolved earlier than the set deadline. These instances can be reported to BetMoose so the deadline can be cut short and the payouts processed accordingly.

Game Platform

BetMoose’s gaming platform is proprietary. There’s nothing much to say about this game platform. While it’s not a highly intuitive platform, it serves its purpose well enough. We just wish that BetMoose’s team made it more efficient and more organized. As we were exploring the account dashboard for this BetMoose review, we realized that we needed to hop from one page to another but these pages don’t really show a lot of information. We think presenting all the functions in one page would be better or at least there should be convenient navigation links or a tabbed presentation so we don’t have to keep going back to the little hovering menu.

BetMoose Is Not Mobile-Friendly

BetMoose’s website is not mobile-friendly. This is a letdown considering that the “games” in this site don’t really require any advanced programming. Simply implementing a responsive web design would have already been a big plus. Also, there are no mobile apps available for either iOS or Android, let alone for Windows Mobile.

Currency, Bet and Withdrawal Policies

BetMoose uses bitcoins only. The minimum bet is 0.005 BTC. If the amount placed as bet is lower than the minimum required, this amount is sent back after four confirmations and deducted for the miner’s fee. However, if the amount sent as a bet is lower than 0.0001 BTC (after miner fees), it will no longer be returned.

Bets placed are final and can no longer be withdrawn unless the bet becomes invalid or is taken down by the host.

There are generally no transaction fees but 3% of the winning bets will be deducted as commission shared by BetMoose and the host of the bet. The sharing is based on the following table:

• Level 0 – starting point for all bet hosts – 0.5%
• Level 1 – for bet hosts who have resolved 1 bet – 0.6%
• Level 2 – for bet hosts with 2 or more resolved bets with a cumulative volume of 10 BTC or more – 0.7%
• Level 3 – for bet hosts with 3 or more resolved bets with a cumulative volume of 30 BTC or more – 0.8%
• Level 4 – for bet hosts with 4 or more resolved bets with a cumulative volume of 50 BTC or more – 0.9%
• Level 5 – for bet hosts with 5 or more resolved bets with a cumulative volume of 100 BTC or more – 1.0%

Take note the 0.5%, 0.6%, 0.7% and other percentages mentioned here refer to their component of the 3% collected from resolved bet payouts. It’s not 0.5% or 0.6% of 3% but 0.5%/3.0% or 0.6%/3.0%.

Bonuses and Rewards

There are neither bonuses nor a rewards program on BetMoose. We did some research for this BetMoose review and found drafts within the website indicating that there is the possibility that matching bonuses and other promotional perks may be offered. For now, though, no such bonuses or promos exist.

BetMoose Support

Customer support on BetMoose is only through email. The designated email address is [email protected]. You may also use the online form on the Contact page for sending emails without having to input the address.

You may notice that there are two persistent buttons on the homepage, at the right side (Feedback) and bottom right (Chat). Unfortunately, these are not customer support live chat facilities. The green Feedback is for players to send suggestions, report bugs, or send other types of messages to the BetMoose admin. The Chat button, on the other hand, is not for live chat support. It is only a chat box for players.

US Players Are Welcome

In one interview, BetMoose creator Adam King said that he does not believe that the United States laws against casino gambling don’t apply to BetMoose. This is accordingly because BetMoose does not fall under the definition of casino gambling. King thinks that BetMoose does not compete with on-shore and licensed gambling operations, which the laws are trying to protect. There is no house edge in BetMoose. The betting model employed by this site does not involve chances, fixed odds, or luck. Prediction markets, after all, may not be considered as a form of gambling.

Well, we have a different opinion. For this BetMoose review, we consider this site as a form of online gambling. Nevertheless, we acknowledge that it’s some grey area. We don’t have the authority to determine which one is black or white here. However, our opinion is that BetMoose is a gambling site regardless of whether or not it is covered by the gambling laws of the United States. We just don’t think that players can be stopped from playing on this site, though. We also don’t think that there are reasons compelling enough to not try experiencing the fun of placing bets and winning or losing on BetMoose.

Licensing and Transaction Security

BetMoose does not have an online gambling license mainly for the reason stated earlier, as said himself by BetMoose’s creator. However, BetMoose assures everyone that transactions are secure and trustworthy.

Withdrawal addresses are locked upon registration with a 2FA approval system. Deposits, on the other hand, are kept in cold storage to ensure protection from various online threats. This is why some withdrawals, especially those involving large amounts, get delayed sometimes.

Pages You Should Visit on BetMoose

BetMoose is an interesting atypical concept in online gambling. To avoid problems, make sure that you read and understand its Terms. There’s also a FAQ page you can consult before contacting customer support for your inquiries or clarifications. Moreover, if you want to get new information or updates about BetMoose, you can follow its social media accounts. You can read updates about or send messages to BetMoose through its Twitter, Facebook, Google+, or Reddit accounts.

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Simple online betting game
• Anonymous online gambling
• Anybody can host and place bets
• Live chat among players
• Those in the UK will get the following message when opening BetMoose.com:
  

Cons

• No mobile friendly website
• No bonuses and rewards system
• No phone and live chat support
• Account management can become a little complicated