British online gambling industry’s gross gambling yield suffered a decline of 0.3% year-on-year, reaching £14.36 billion in the year that ended on March 31st, 2019. According to new figures provided by the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC), the revenue of the British remote gambling sector fell by 0.6% to £5.3 billion even though higher stakes were reported.
Yesterday, the UK gambling regulatory body posted its annual industry statistics report where the figures were included. According to records, this has been the first-ever annual decline registered for the online gambling sector that has so far been on the rise. It is a bit larger in comparison to the 12-month period which ended in September 2018. The next market report of the UK Gambling Commission is expected to be published in May 2019.
Online gambling represented 37.1% of the gross gambling yield of the entire British gambling industry. Online casino games contributed the most to online gambling, generating a £3.11-billion yield that saw a 6% increase. Digital slots’ yield rose by 5.7% to £2.12 billion. Online roulette experienced a massive increase both in its turnover and gross gambling yield to £4.48 billion and £448.2 million, respectively.
When it comes to sports betting online, the activity’s yield fell by 10% to 2.03 billion, in spite of the 2.7% increase in stakes. The most popular sport for remote betting was football, but still, its yield fell by 1.5% to £991.2 million, despite the stakes rose by 5.2% thanks to the 2018 FIFA World Cup which took place over the period. Horse racing was second, with stakes increasing by 8.5% to £9.64 billion, and a 15% yield decline to £522.1 million.
Lower GGY in UK Retail Gambling Sector Continues in 2018/19
As revealed by the UKGC, the number of new online account registrations rose by about one million to 33.3 million. A 9.3$ decline to 31 million, however, was registered in the number of active accounts.
At the same time, the trend for falling gross gambling yield in the retail gambling sector of the UK continued. The gross gambling yield generated by the retail betting sector in 2018/19 was £3.25 billion, which is pretty much similar to the one registered in the previous year.
Land-based casinos’ yield fell by 10.3% decline to £1.06 billion, while the National Lottery saw a 2.4% increase in its yield, which rose to £3.08 billion.
This is the last report of the UK gambling regulatory body prior to the implementation of the new £2 maximum betting stake on controversial fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBTs) offered by high-street bookmakers in the UK. The gross gambling yield of the machines fell by less than 1% to £1.83 billion, with category B2 machines falling by almost one-third to £1.15 billion. Category B3 machines, which are actually the FOBTs, however, reported a massive increase in their gross gambling yield to £670.8 million, regardless of the fact their maximum stakes were already slashed to £2.
- Author
Olivia Cole
