| Abstract: |
We evaluate the impact of timing on decision outcome, when both the timing and
the relevant decision are chosen under uncertainty. Betting markets provide
the testing ground, as we exploit an original dataset containing more than one
million online bets on games of the Italian Major Soccer League. We find that
individuals perform systematically better when they place their bets farther
away from the game day. The better performance of early bettors holds
controlling for (time-invariant) unobservable ability, learning during the
season, and timing of the odds. We attribute this result to the increase of
noisy information on game day, which hampers the capacity of late
(non-professional) bettors to use very simple prediction methods, such as team
rankings or last game results. We also find that more successful bettors tend
to bet in advance,focus on a smaller set of events, and prefer events
associated with smaller betting odds. JEL codes: D81, D83. Keywords: decision
timing, information overload, betting, sports forecasting. |