Baccarat, or Punto Banco and its French cousin chemmy, began in medieval Italy as a card game for upper class aristocrats and has now become the casino’s second-most popular table game after blackjack. Its popularity has created a great deal of drama and theory, as players watch for patterns in past results to try and shift the odds toward them. Despite the fact that basic strategy only yields a 0.5 percent disadvantage, the game has many fans who will place big bets on hunches and irrational trends.

The game is played with a banker and player, and the objective is to bet on which hand will have a total value closest to nine. The player and banker are dealt two cards each, and the value of the hand is determined by adding up the values of the cards. Tens and face cards are valued at zero, while aces are worth one. A winning bet pays out 1:1 minus a five percent commission.

Unlike most casino games, which follow strict procedures for shuffling and dealing errors, baccarat dealers frequently make mistakes in dealing the cards. Instead of burning the mistake card as is standard in blackjack, the dealer places it aside for a “free” hand to be dealt. The free hand is then used in the next round, but with bets off and without the mistake card visible to the customers. This procedure maintains the (perceived) order of the shoe and avoids a loss of customer trust.

When a new deck of cards is brought into the game, it must be inspected on both the backs and faces by both the floor supervisor and the dealer before being placed into the shuffler or being manually shuffled. This is an extremely time-consuming process. To speed up the process, some casinos use pre-shuffled cards which can be immediately introduced into the game without the lengthy inspection.

Asian gamblers often find certain numbers lucky or unlucky, and these preferences must be taken into account by management when setting the table layout. For example, the number four is viewed as an unlucky number in Chinese and Southeast Asian cultures. This number should be avoided on a baccarat table.

Another superstitious issue in baccarat is the use of three-card hands, which are often viewed as having a greater probability of victory than traditional eight-card hands. These hands are also sometimes referred to as “squeeze” hands. In addition to their statistical superiority, three-card hands can help increase a table’s average bet per round. Consequently, three-card hands should be favored by a casino when setting the table layout.