Does The Betting Industry Price Gender?

Abstract

This research addresses the importance of gender in prices in the sports betting industry. Specifically, we investigate the impact of gender bias in the prices that bookmakers offer for tennis matches. Despite widespread evidence of gender bias both in the practice of the sport and its media coverage, tennis is one of the sports that has done most to achieve equality. The analysis of 51,881 tennis matches reveals that betting firms quote higher prices for women’s matches than for men’s, and that this finding still holds even when considering uncertainty due to the surprise factor and the media attention. The separate analysis of two bookmakers strengthens the evidence for the role of media attention as a source of gender-related information asymmetry.