Global Online Gambling Market Grows Steadily

The most recent publication by yStats.com reports that the online gambling market is growing steadily in all parts of the globe. In addition, the publication of the business intelligence company based in Hamburg points out that mobile devices have being increasingly used by gamblers worldwide to access gambling websites. The publication is called Global Online Gambling and Betting Market 2015.

Conclusions from the Findings

The findings in the publication conclude that thanks to the growth of iGaming some gambling companies have consolidated and offer gambling products on the web. In addition, more counties are licensing and regulating online gambling rather than trying to ban it nationwide. yStats predicts that the global online gambling market would maintain “single-digit growth rates” over the next 4 years and is expected to reach a revenue of “double-digit number in billion Euros”.

Mobile gambling and the use of mobile devices to play casino games and other products on the go also contributed toward the growth of iGaming. Many virtual gambling destinations have reported a revenue increase coming from the mobile gambling industry.

Other factors that contributed to the growth of the industry are the acquisition deals that took place over the past two years as well as the varied performance of the world’s leading companies in the online gaming and betting sectors. For example, William Hill and Paddy Power showed an increase of online net revenues last year by approximately 20%, while Betfair showed only a moderate revenue increase. Bwin.Party, on the other hand, showed a revenue decline.

Europe the World’s Largest Online Gambling Market

The biggest iGaming market in the world was the European market with many countries establishing regulatory regimes. The number is expected to increase with the Netherlands establishing new industry regulations and seeking extra tax revenues. In Italy, for example, online casino games outperformed the virtual gambling market in 2014.

The situation in Russia remains the same and online gambling is still illegal, but there is a separate regime formed under an independent organization. In Asia, there are some governments that want to limit iGaming. In Singapore, online gambling is forbidden in 2015, while in China and South Korea several illegal gambling websites were arrested. The regime in Australia is more liberal with foreign operators being interested in the interactive gaming sector.

In the United States, of the three US states that allow iGaming, New Jersey generates the largest revenue in 2014. In addition, more states are expected to legalize online gambling as revenues continue to increase but at somewhat moderate level compared to the predictions a year ago.

Furthermore, in Mexico and Brazil, new iGaming bills are put forwards with the aim to regulate the virtual gambling industry, but legalization is still not approved. Last but not least, on the African continent, South Africa announced at the beginning in 2015 that it has no plans to legalize online gambling even though there are calls to do so.