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Natural Hand Side Bets

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Introduction

Natural Hand Side Bets

There are various baccarat side bets based on a Banker or Player obtaining a natural hand. This page lists those I have heard of.

Natural 8

The Natural 8 bet pays if the chosen side, Banker or Player, has a natural total of 8. Wins can pay either 8 or 9 to 1. The odds are the same on both the Banker and Player side.

I have never actually seen these side bets but believe they were popular in the 1960's, when Ed Thorp wrote a paper for the Journal of the American Statistical Association on how to beat this bet, and the Natural 9, by card counting. Perhaps that explains why it seems to be no longer around.

The following table shows the odds for a win of 9 to 1. The lower right cell shows a house edge of 5.47%.

Natural 8 — Win Pays 9 to 1

Event Pays Combinations Probability Return
Win 9 472,508,456,071,680 0.094532 0.850788
Loss -1 4,525,889,819,431,680 0.905468 -0.905468
Total   4,998,398,275,503,360 1.000000 -0.054680

The following table shows the odds for the Natural 8 bet at a win of 8 to 1. The lower right cell shows a house edge of 14.92%.

Natural 8 — Win Pays 8 to 1

Event Pays Combinations Probability Return
Win 8 472,508,456,071,680 0.094532 0.756256
Loss -1 4,525,889,819,431,680 0.905468 -0.905468
Total   4,998,398,275,503,360 1.000000 -0.149212

Obviously, this bet, and the Natural 9, would be highly vulnerable to card counters. There are some links below in the External Links section for more information on that.

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Natural 9

The Natural 9 bet pays if the chosen side, Banker or Player, has a natural total of 9. Wins can pay either 8 or 9 to 1. The odds are the same on both the Banker and Player side.

The following table shows the odds for a win of 9 to 1. The lower right cell shows a house edge of 5.10%.

Natural 9 — Win Pays 9 to 1

Event Pays Combinations Probability Return
Win 9 474,361,430,409,216 0.094903 0.854124
Loss -1 4,524,036,845,094,140 0.905097 -0.905097
Total   4,998,398,275,503,360 1.000000 -0.050973

The following table shows the odds for the Natural 8 bet at a win of 8 to 1. The lower right cell shows a house edge of 14.59%.

Natural 9 — Win Pays 8 to 1

Event Pays Combinations Probability Return
Win 8 474,361,430,409,216 0.094903 0.759222
Loss -1 4,524,036,845,094,140 0.905097 -0.905097
Total   4,998,398,275,503,360 1.000000 -0.145876

Natural 8 or 9

The Natural 8 or 9 is a pair of side bets on the Banker and Player hands that the chosen side will have a natural two-card total of 8 or 9. The bets can be found at Internet casinos using Ezugi software in their Knockout Baccarat game.

The following table shows the odds for both at a win of 9 to 1. The lower right cell shows a house edge of 5.28%.

Natural 8 or 9

Event Pays Combinations Probability Return
Win 4 946,869,886,480,896 0.189435 0.757739
Loss -1 4,051,528,389,022,460 0.810565 -0.810565
Total   4,998,398,275,503,360 1.000000 -0.052827

Live gaming casinos by SA Gaming offer this pair of bets, but wins pay only 3.5. This increases the house edge to 14.75%.

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External Links

  • A Favorable Side Bet in Nevada Baccarat by Edward O. Thorp and William E. Walden, first published in the Journal of the American Statistical Association, Vol. 61, No. 314, Part 1 (Jun., 1966), pp. 313-328.