Question by Irish 313: Gambling: Would buying Irish Prize Bonds be considered gambling?
I guess not because in gambling there always has to be the risk that you’ll lose, yes? With Prize Bonds you buy however many you want, have the chance to win x amount each week but you can cash them back in for the amount you originally paid at any time you want, so I guess it’s not really gambling then is it? We have about a grand and a half of em but only won once and that was only €75 : ( http://www.prizebonds.ie But it’s still exciting to check each Friday to see if we have won, we live in hope, lol.
We used have €6000 in Prize Bonds but reduced that to €1500.
Best answer:
Answer by RETURN OF THE WRATH OF THE FIST
Yes it is gambling, you are in fact losing every day that your money sits in the prize bonds, money naturally depreciates in value due to inflation, so although the numeric quantity of your money is not decreasing the value of it is, think back to when you were younger, remember when a pint was a pound!
Put your money in a savings account, then you can earn money on your savings. The irish bonds companies are basically putting your money into a savings account for you, making the interest on it, taking most of that interest money for themselves and then randomly allocating prizes to investors, this is a great system for them, but a poor system for you. If you want your interest money pooled, split between you and the irish prize bonds company and then randomly allocated to various people go ahead. Or you could cut out the middle man and take the interest money for yourself.
Obviously you don’t get the thrill of checking every friday, you could of course take the interest money you make and then gamble that on something like roulette, which would you give you a better chance winning larger amounts and more frequently, and like your current system your numeric quantity of invested money would not be decreasing. Although I wouldn’t reccomend that, because thats gambling and its daft.
In summary put your money in a descent savings account and stop gambling with it!
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!