Excel formula to be first in the queue

[tees]

Hi,

I've been looking through the forum all day to try and get an answer to my question - hope someone can help!

What excel formula do I use to do the following:

I've backed a horse on the place market early doors at nice odds and I want to lay it back at the lowest possible price. But I always want to be first in the lay queue. If the trade doesn't work out and the lay side pushes past the odds I backed at, I want to cancel. I won't trade out for a loss.

So far in the 'trigger' cell I've written the following formula:

=IF(F5<Y5,"LAY","CANCEL")

'Y5'=the odds I backed at. In the odds cell 'R5' I have 'F5+0.01' (of course if the odds go over 2.00 I'll have to change the 'R5' cell to 'F5+0.02' - I don't know how to automate for that yet, so any ideas are welcome).

The above works to some extent. However, what do I do if someone puts in a lay just above my odds? I want to be at the front of the queue at all times. How do I get my lay to get to the front again?

Also, I want to be able to lay at a lower price if there appear gaps in the market between my price and the next lay price down. And lastly (I think), if there is no one below me in the market I want to set a minimum lay price.

Hmmm.... I thought this would be an easy question to ask - it's turned into multiple questions. Hope someone can help, as it's driving me insane.

Thanks,

tees

[Ian]

Tees, I can't help you with keeping in front of the queue, but the way I "top" the current back price is to have a table with all the odds in col A and in col B I have the next price up eg,

1.01 1.02
1.02 1.03
..
..
..
10.0 10.5
10.5 11.0 etc etc

Then I use VLOOKUP using the odds in col F to populate col R.

Of course, if Gary's reading this, it would be neat to have a trigger that "tops" the current back price for lays or "undercuts" the current lay price for backs.

[tees]

That's an excellent idea Ian. Thanks very much.

Of course, if Gary's reading this, it would be neat to have a trigger that "tops" the current back price for lays or "undercuts" the current lay price for backs.

In respect to the above, it sounds as if you might be thinking that it's not possible without Gary having to do some tinkering to the software. If that's correct can any one let me know? I don't want to spend the next few days chasing my tail trying to figure something out that can't be done.

Thanks again Ian, and to anyone else who has thoughts or ideas on this.

Be lucky!

/tees