Eliot Jacobson Ph.D.

I recently went to Gambler's General Store in Las Vegas and looked through their cards for sale. I segregated the cards by the pattern on the back-side and purchased one deck for each unique distinct design I observed. Altogether, I purchased 14 decks.

Casinos use loss rebates as an incentive to draw high-limit play. The player who wins gets to keep 100% of his winnings. The losing player is given back a certain percentage of his losses as a direct cash rebate. Typical rebates range from 5% up to 20%, depending on the player’s bankroll and average bet.

This post concerns significant errors in the article “Examining a Gambler’s Claims: Probabilistic Fact-Checking and Don Johnson’s Extraordinary Blackjack Winning Streak,” written by W.J. Hurley, Jack Brimberg and Richard Kohar [HBK]. This article appeared in the February, 2014 issue of CHANCE magazine, Vol. 27, No. 1, pages 31-37.

Baccarat is an interesting casino game, yet it’s still relatively unknown within the U.S. However, the game attracts high rollers and one sure way of keeping the big money playing at the tables is through Non-negotiable chip programs.

As you may recall, Revel Casino had a 100% loss rebate promotion throughout the month of July. I wrote about beating it in this blog post. The question if this promotion was a good idea is still open.

Loss rebate analysis has been a common topic in this blog. There's a good reason: it is one of the top advantage play opportunities worldwide. Exploiting loss rebates is how Don Johnson crushed Atlantic City.