Editor’s note: This article was first published in October 2010. Spain regulated online gambling in 2011 (Ley 13/2011), so the legal and tax situation described here has since changed.
It’s worth mentioning some less usual ways of making money online. They aren’t really recommended, but it’s true that some people have built very profitable businesses out of them. They require some knowledge, experience and a certain amount of “cool-headedness”, but beyond that you can turn this “business” into a part-time source of extra income or a full-time business.
Carlos and Javier are two Spaniards who, like other young men, discovered online poker sites. Although they were neither experts nor great poker players, they saw the chance to play against beginners from all over the world, in an attempt to invest little without taking risks.
What started as entertainment grew over time: these two young men, aged 23 and 26, expanded their team of “workers” and set up their business in an apartment with 8 computers and multiple screens. They discovered a playing strategy and put it into practice.
Their online strategy includes playing only at tables with low starting stakes (€0.40–1) and never doubling a bet, whatever cards you have. They found that, through simple maths and probability, they always came out ahead at the end of the day. Since those winnings weren’t large, there was only one way to increase them: playing at more tables.
Today, these two young men have turned online poker into their way of life, each earning more than €8,000 a month, although they insist it is far from easy and takes a great deal of cool-headedness and discipline. Above all, they say you must see the game purely as a way of making money, because if you start getting excited about the game itself, you can end up falling into gambling addiction, as happened to a former colleague of theirs who only ever lost money.
When we talk about online poker, we don’t mean online casinos: a casino is run by a machine, whereas poker is played between people. If you play against the system, you’ll always lose.
Roberto’s case is similar. He is 33 and has been making a living for 5 years from betting on games on sites such as Gameduell.
These sites let you bet €1, €2 or €5 against your opponent. If you win, your opponent loses the money. Roberto says that here, too, you need to develop discipline and accept that you won’t always win, although he knows 3 of the games he plays most inside out and considers losing unlikely.
He says that when he started out he was making around €15 a day, and these days there are days when he finishes with €240 in winnings.
As we can see, the possibilities for making money or doing business online are endless, although some of them aren’t for everyone, since not everybody could keep up the discipline and composure needed day after day.
Both say there are weeks when they have to switch off completely, because they are psychologically tired and it would be a mistake to sit in front of the screen in that state.
Further reading
- Ways to do business online
- Business ideas in leisure and tourism
- Business ideas with social media
- How to start a business with no money
- Calvin Ayre, the online gambling magnate
Featured image: Santeri Viinamäki, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
