Coins Flips, Fair Casinos and Martingales

Resources

• Workshop Notes
• Playground

Workshop Synopsis

Suppose we flip a fair coin repeatedly until we get a specific sequence. On average, which sequence requires more flips: Heads-Heads-Tails or Heads-Tails-Head? What are the chances of seeing HHT before HTH? And what does this all have to do with casinos? In this workshop, we will answer these questions with martingales, a powerful mathematical tool that has widespread applications in gambling, statistics and the stock market.