To say it in advance: this topic requires so much writing and explanations from my side that I will have to divide it into three parts:

1. Part I: Explanation of how Asian handicap betting works, why Asian bookmakers are vital for every serious bettor plus some background information.
2. Part II: A simple example of arbitrage betting, where combining Asian with European odds leads to a save profit independent from the result of the game.
3. Part III: A more complicated example which requires some more mathematical skills.

I try to present the stuff in a way that every part can also be read as stand alone article. Who for example already knows how Asian handicap betting works in general, may be only interested in parts II and III.

What does Asian handicap betting (AH) mean and how does it work?

On European betting sites it is quite common to bet on one of the three possible outcomes of a soccer game, on "home win", "draw" or "away win" (also called "1", "X" and "2").
In Asia though, most bettors prefer to place bets where the game doesn't start with the 0 : 0 score, but instead there are added quarter, half or full points to the score of the underdog. That means if you bet on the favorite, depending on the handicap it may for example not be sufficient to win the bet, if your team wins with lets say 1 : 0 only.

Let me show you some examples of Asian Handicap betting on the basis of the GUI of one of the biggest Asian bookmakers, MAXBet (sister site of the "famous" IBCBet):

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If you take a look at the game above "Deportivo Alaves" against "Celta Vigo" from the first Spanish division, you can see that the name of the favorite team (Alaves) is written in red, that means the Asian handicap is put against it. Lets now consider the first column "FT. HDP" (full time handicap). MAXBet offers three handicap lines for this game 0.5-1 (also called 0.75), 0.5 and 1.

Let's begin with most simple one: 0.5 (you can bet "Alaves -0.5" or "Celta Vigo +0.5").

• One choice is to bet on the favorite (Alaves), then 0.5 points are subtracted from the end result. That means if Alaves wins, you win the bet (odds are 1.76 as you can check in the screenshot; that means if you place for example 100 euro your gross winnings will be
  1.76 · 100 = 176 euro, while the net winning are 76 euro).
  If the game ends as a draw or if Celta Vigo wins you lose the bet and thus your stake.

• The other choice is to bet on the outsider (Celta Vigo), then 0.5 points are added to the end result. That again means if Celta Vigo wins or the game ends as a draw, you win the bet (odds are 2.21).
  If Alaves wins you lose the bet and thus your stake.

Let's consider now: 1 (you can bet "Alaves -1" or "Celta Vigo +1").

• One choice is to bet on the favorite (Alaves), then 1 point is subtracted from the end result. That means if Alaves wins by a margin of at least two goals (for example with 2 : 0), you win the bet (odds are 2.40).
  If Alaves wins by a margin of exactly one goal (for example with 1 : 0) the bet ends as a draw and your stake will be returned into your account.
  If the game ends as a draw or if Celta Vigo wins you lose the bet and thus your stake.

• The other choice is to bet on the outsider (Celta Vigo), then 1 points is added to the end result. That again means if the game ends as a draw or Celta Vigo wins you win the bet (odds are 1.65).
  If Alaves wins by a margin of exactly one goal (for example with 1 : 0) the bet ends as a draw and your stake will be returned into your account.
  If Alaves wins by a margin of at least two goals (for example with 2 : 0), you lose the bet.

Let's consider now: 0.75 (you can bet "Alaves -0.75" or "Celta Vigo +0.75").

• One choice is to bet on the favorite (Alaves), then "0.75" points are subtracted from the end result. That means if Alaves wins by a margin of at least two goals (for example with 2 : 0), you win the bet (odds are 2.01).
  If Alaves wins by a margin of exactly one goal (for example with 1 : 0) half of your stake is considered to be a winning bet (odds 2.01) and the rest of your stake will be returned into your account (the other half of your bet is considered as a draw). One could also say that half of your stake was placed on Alaves -1 and the other half on Alaves -0.5, therefore it is called Alaves -0.75 or also Alaves -0.5/1.
  If the game ends as a draw or if Celta Vigo wins you lose the bet and thus your stake.

• The other choice is to bet on the outsider (Celta Vigo), then "0.75" points are added to the end result. That means if the game ends as a draw or Celta Vigo wins you win the bet (odds are 1.93).
  If Alaves wins by a margin of exactly one goal (for example with 1 : 0) half of your stake is considered to be a losing bet and the rest of your stake will be returned into your account (the other half of your bet is considered as a draw). One could also say that half of your stake was placed on Celta Vigo +1 and the other half on Celta Vigo +0.5, therefore it is called Celta Vigo +0.75 or also Celta Vigo +0.5/1.
  If Alaves wins by a margin of at least two goals (for example with 2 : 0), you lose the bet.

Here you can find further explanations and a table of different types of Asian handicap bets.

What are the benefits of using Asian betting sites?

Using Asian bookmakers offers the following advantages:

• The Asian handicap odds of real Asian bookmakers are simply way better than the odds of European sports books. If you would place for example AH bets with MAXBet on both possible "0.5" results of the game "Alaves - Celta Vigo" the bookmaker profit would only be 2 % of your stake (1/1.76 + 1/2.21 = 1.02). If you do the same with the European book Tipico on "1X2 odds" the bookmaker profit would be 5 % of the stake (1/1.75 + 1/3.6 + 1/5 = 1.05). To learn more about these calculations I recommend to read my article about betting exchanges.

• The betting limits of Asian bookmakers are much higher than the limits of their competitors. It is very easy to place tens of thousands of euros on a single soccer event, if you chose one of the European major soccer leagues or international games.
  Furthermore European bookies will limits your stakes to very small amounts as soon as you start to be successful. They are monitoring the accounts of every customer very thoroughly, whereas the big Asian bookmakers just don't care if a single customer is winning or losing in the long run: their only concern is to balance their own book in every single sports event. Their own win has to result from the sum of all bets of all customers on an event. To reach that they use very modern software which changes the prices very fast according to the placed stakes.

• Most of the time they are the first ones to initiate price changes (the competitors will only follow the odds movements then). Therefore they can be used as early indicators of market movements.

• They are offering a huge amounts of live bets.

What are their disadvantages?

Asian bookmakers intentionally don't apply to get European licenses to prevent paying taxes and fees to the governments. On the one hand that means they are able to offer much better odds, but on the other hand the bettor has no guarantee to receive his funds in case of a dispute, bankruptcy of an Asian bookmaker or also just cheating by the sports book.
Aside from that many European countries try to forbid the direct use of their pages so that one is forced to utilize some technical tricks or using agents as middlemen between the bettors and the sports books. Such agents create bookmaker accounts for the bettors, so that they can place their Asian handicap bets and enjoy the high limits. :) However also concerning these agents it needs some knowledge of the market and much experience to be able to decide which ones are trustworthy and which may cheat you.

Selection of recommendable Asian sports books

From my own experience the following Asian bookmakers are most reliable: MAXBet, IBCBet, SBOBet and PinBet88. Depending on your location you may not be able to open these pages thanks to your government ... :)

An example for a really recommendable agent is Asianconnect88. Using his service you can open accounts with every of the bookies above. He is actually offering an interface which offers odds of several Asian books at the same time so that it is easy to see which of them offers the best odds for which event on a certain moment ... See photo below:

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This was the theoretical part of today. I have to say that I really have no idea if writing about this topic (Asian handicap betting and Asian bookmakers) is an interesting topic for enough readers here on Steemit. I understand that it is kind of a rather hidden niche. Therefore I will wait for the reactions and then decide if I should continue this "part I" by the announced follow-ups "part II" and "part III". It will also depend on if I find enough time to do that. Anyway I hope some of you enjoyed my article! :)

At the end some stories about the Asian betting markets for the curious ones. :-)

Finally I have selected a small collection of articles about the Asian betting market, which may be quite interesting and exciting to read:

• How the boss of IBCBet got arrested in the USA (very long).
• Again about IBCBet (German text).
• The following text originally appeared under that link: http://www.theonlinewire.com/articleView.aspx?ID=2500 , but is not available anymore. I have to say these days I had an account with Pointbet too ...:
  "TOW Industry Newswire, 3/18/2007
  Pointbet collapses owing in excess of $4,5M
  Further to the news of Indonesian bookmaker Pointbet shut down new information surfaced on the overall amount, in excess of $4,5M, Pointbet.com owes its customers. Thousands of punters have been hit by the sudden shut down of Indonesian based Pointbet. According to the latest reports the Asia facing bookmaker stiffed customers out of a staggering $4,5M. TheOnlinewire.com is in direct contact with a group of approximately 100 unfortunate punters affected by the Pointbet's collapse. This group alone is owed some $400,000. Chances to recover funds from the Indonesian bookmaker are very slim at best. Individual attempts to contact the book's ownership have failed. According to on-site reports Pointbet's owner house is surrounded by armed bodyguards. Neighbors told local investigators that the bookie hasn't been seen in days. Further attempts to approach the failed bookie may put punters at serious risk, given Indonesian Law Enforcement heavy handed crack down on internet gambling since the summer of 2005. “Starting from today, the National Police chief does not wish to see gambling in any form” Indonesia National Police spokesperson Brig. Gen. Aryanto Budihardjo told reporters on July 28 2005. The announcement came after Indonesia National Police chief Gen. Sutanto had given one week to police chiefs all over Indonesia in which to eradicate any forms of gambling. Budihardjo said that the National Police chief has ordered all police chiefs to take stern measures against all gamblers arrested in the field. TheOnlinewire.com reminds all punters to bookmark our Industry Newswire to stay on top of the latest news on the gambling industry. Punters are also recommended to read our sportsbooks ratings in our comprehensive Rating Guide before signing up and funding their wagering accounts.
  TOW Industry Newswire - Published March 18 2007 - 6.15am EST - TheOnlinewire.com"

So better be careful! :-)