Bankroll and Line-Shopping Worksheet

A CSV you can download and edit. The sheet holds hypothetical numbers for two questions that are easy to mix up: how much a chosen stake wins at a price, and how much you must stake to win a chosen amount. It also separates a stake that stays fixed from a stake that is resized after each loss.

This is not a calculator. The file has no formulas and no macros. Example rows are already filled with fiction. Rows marked EDITABLE are blank, and a spreadsheet will not fill them in for you. Nothing here is a pick, a real price, a profit projection, or a unit size that is safe for you.

Download the CSV worksheet

The file is bankroll-line-shopping-worksheet.csv. 18+ / 21+ where required. Bet only where it is legal for you. Do not use money needed for essentials.

Two questions, two different stakes

Flat stake. You already chose the dollars at risk. stake_usd is that amount at every price on the row. profit_if_win is the profit if that one bet wins. Change the price and the profit changes. The stake does not.

Stake-to-win. You already chose the profit you want if the bet wins. target_win_usd is that profit. stake_to_win_target is the dollars you have to risk to get it. Change the price and the stake changes.

Do not add a flat-stake profit to a stake-to-win stake and call it one result. The sheet keeps them on separate rows for that reason.

unit_usd on a row is bankroll_usd × unit_pct for the bankroll written on that row. On the streak rows it is only the first stake. Later bets stay at that dollar amount, or shrink, depending on which row you are reading.

Negative prices in the examples

For a negative American price, drop the minus and call that number A. A price of −110 means A is 110.

• Profit if stake S wins: S × 100 / A
• Stake required to win a target W: W × A / 100
• Break-even win rate: A / (A + 100)

Break-even here means the win rate at which wins and losses balance at that price alone. It is not a forecast, and it ignores anything the price does not already show.

Hypothetical: the same $50 stake

Bankroll on the row: 5000. One percent of that is 50. Both prices risk 50.

If the bet wins, −105 pays 2.17 more profit than −110 (47.62 − 45.45). If it loses, both take the same 50. A better price does not by itself mean the bet has an edge.

Hypothetical: the same $50 profit target

This is a different bet. The target profit is 50. The stake is what moves.

−105 risks 2.50 less to win the same 50. That 55.0 is not the profit from the flat-stake row, and that 50 target is not the 50 that was risked above.

Hypothetical: twenty losses, fixed stake or resized stake

Starting figure: 5000. These are twenty losses in a row, which is a teaching sequence, not a prediction.

Fixed stake, taken from the starting bankroll and not resized.

• 1% of 5000 is 50, and the stake stays 50. Twenty losses: 20 × 50 = 1000. Dollars left: 4000. The 1000 is 20% of the starting 5000 only because every stake stayed 50.
• 5% of 5000 is 250, and the stake stays 250. Twenty losses: 20 × 250 = 5000. Dollars left: 0. The sheet’s “wiped” result is this fixed-stake rule. It is not what happens if 5% is recalculated after each loss.

Resized stake, reset after each loss to the same percent of what remains.

• At 1%, the fraction left after 20 losses is 0.99^20 = 0.8179069375972308. Dollars left: 5000 × that = 4089.53. Dollars lost: 910.47, not 1000. The first stake is still 50. Later stakes are smaller.
• At 5%, the fraction left is 0.95^20 = 0.3584859224085422. Dollars left: 1792.43. Dollars lost: 3207.57, not the whole 5000.

1% and 5% are labels so the two rules can be compared. They are not safe sizes, recommended sizes, or sizes that keep a bankroll intact.

A positive price is a different formula

+150 is not “110 with a different sign,” and it is not −150.

• Flat stake of 50: profit if it wins = 50 × 150 / 100 = 75.
• Stake to win a target of 50: 50 × 100 / 150 = 33.333…, recorded as 33.33.
• Break-even win rate: 100 / (150 + 100) = 0.40, recorded as 0.400000.

Those two +150 lines are separate bets, same as the −110 pair.

Using the blank rows

The three EDITABLE rows ship empty. Open the CSV in a spreadsheet if you want to type. Nothing in those cells will calculate. If you want a unit in dollars, multiply the bankroll you typed by the fraction you typed. If you want a profit-if-win or a stake-to-win, use the formula that matches the price sign, and only one of those questions at a time.

Prices you enter are whatever you actually see at books you are allowed to use. The example prices are made up. Losing the money you enter is possible. A smaller unit is not protection, and a better price is not a promise of profit.

Read the explainers

• Bankroll management and unit sizing
• Line shopping and getting a better price
• Understanding variance
• Responsible gambling