A comment on Paul and Weinbach’s (2005) “Bettor preferences and efficient markets in totals markets”

Paul and Weinbach (J Econ Financ 29:409–415, 2005) tested the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) in college and arena football betting markets. The authors found that the totals markets were not efficient, with the “over” bet overvalued, but suggested the likelihood that this would change over time as bettors incorporated more information. In this paper, we find, based on a more recent NCAA college football dataset, that the market has largely corrected itself. The totals market in major college football over the period of 2003–2015 shows an efficient market in that neither a naive strategy of betting “over” nor “under” is profitable.