• About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms
  • Unsubscribe
No Result
View All Result
Live and Invest Overseas
FREE REPORT
BEST PLACES TO RETIRE
*No spam: We will NEVER give your email address to anyone else.
  • HOME
  • COUNTRIES
    • Top Destinations
      • Portugal
      • Panama
      • Belize
      • France
      • Colombia
      • Dominican Republic
      • Thailand
      • Mexico
      • Spain
      • Argentina
    • Browse All Countries
    • Best For
      • Retire Overseas Index
      • Health Care
      • Cost of Living
      • Investing in Real Estate
      • Editor’s Picks For Retirement
      • Establishing Residency
      • Starting an Online Business
      • Single Women
      • Playing Golf
  • BUDGETS
    • Super Cheap ($)
      • Cuenca, Ecuador
      • Chiang Mai, Thailand
      • The Philippines
      • Las Tablas, Panama
      • Granada, Nicaragua
    • Cheap ($$)
      • Algarve, Portugal
      • Medellin, Colombia
      • Boquete, Panama
      • Carcassone, France
      • Buenos Aires, Argentina
    • Affordable ($$$)
      • Abruzzo, Italy
      • Barcelona, Spain
      • Las Terrenas, Dominican Republic
      • Puerto Vallarta, Mexico
      • Costa de Oro, Uruguay
    • Luxury On A Budget ($$$$)
      • Ambergris Caye, Belize
      • Paris, France
      • Panama City Beach Area
  • Real Estate
  • ARCHIVES
    • Living & Retiring Overseas
    • Raising A Family Abroad
    • Foreign Residency & Citizenship
    • Offshore Diversification
    • Our Latest On Coronavirus ⚠️
  • Making Money
    • International Real Estate
    • Banking
    • Employment
    • Investing
  • CONFERENCES
  • BOOKSTORE
Live and Invest Overseas
  • HOME
  • COUNTRIES
    • Top Destinations
      • Portugal
      • Panama
      • Belize
      • France
      • Colombia
      • Dominican Republic
      • Thailand
      • Mexico
      • Spain
      • Argentina
    • Browse All Countries
    • Best For
      • Retire Overseas Index
      • Health Care
      • Cost of Living
      • Investing in Real Estate
      • Editor’s Picks For Retirement
      • Establishing Residency
      • Starting an Online Business
      • Single Women
      • Playing Golf
  • BUDGETS
    • Super Cheap ($)
      • Cuenca, Ecuador
      • Chiang Mai, Thailand
      • The Philippines
      • Las Tablas, Panama
      • Granada, Nicaragua
    • Cheap ($$)
      • Algarve, Portugal
      • Medellin, Colombia
      • Boquete, Panama
      • Carcassone, France
      • Buenos Aires, Argentina
    • Affordable ($$$)
      • Abruzzo, Italy
      • Barcelona, Spain
      • Las Terrenas, Dominican Republic
      • Puerto Vallarta, Mexico
      • Costa de Oro, Uruguay
    • Luxury On A Budget ($$$$)
      • Ambergris Caye, Belize
      • Paris, France
      • Panama City Beach Area
  • Real Estate
  • ARCHIVES
    • Living & Retiring Overseas
    • Raising A Family Abroad
    • Foreign Residency & Citizenship
    • Offshore Diversification
    • Our Latest On Coronavirus ⚠️
  • Making Money
    • International Real Estate
    • Banking
    • Employment
    • Investing
  • CONFERENCES
  • BOOKSTORE
No Result
View All Result
Live and Invest Overseas
No Result
View All Result
Home Countries Europe

The UK online casino industry: a review

Kathleen Peddicord by Kathleen Peddicord
Sep 25, 2017
in Europe
0
a man in a suit at a casino table going all in with its multicolor chips
215
SHARES
3.1k
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

 

The UK gambling industry is more than 2,000 years old. It started with wagers on jousting and the coin toss, before moving into private gambling clubs. The first city centre casinos arrived in the late 90s, and there are now 140 land-based casinos across the UK. However, along with betting shops, bingo halls and arcades, physical casinos only account for around 66% of the UK’s entire gambling industry.

The Growth of Gambling

A man with casino chips

The other 34% of the gambling industry is made up through online gambling. Including things like sports betting and online bingo, this percentage has grown significantly year on year, and is a clear indicator of the direction the industry is going. Referred to as the ‘remote’ sector, players who play casino games, bet on sports, or play bingo using their mobile phones, tablets or plain old laptops and computers are generating £4.7 billion each year. This 1.34% increase from 2016 may not seem much, but the online gambling industry is actually rapidly taking away market share from physical gaming locations, with more bingo halls, amusement arcades and now even casinos closing than ever before.

The Pros of Gambling Online

Online casino gaming is a different animal compared to gaming in a real-world casino. For starters, you don’t have to travel anywhere to play games, and you certainly don’t need to spend any money on drinks, food, or membership fees. The biggest difference however is the accessibility. With casino websites operating 24 hours a day and membership available to anyone over 18 who has a debit or credit card, gamblers can enjoy a game of blackjack on the commute to work or on a lazy Sunday. This vastly improved accessibility is one of the key reasons why market share is growing so rapidly. With physical casinos having to wait until Friday and Saturday evening to make their money, online casinos websites have a steady income 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, as well as the peak times which see improved revenue.

The Regulations

A man with a magnifying glass looking at a paper

Running an online casino comes with a few stipulations, and in a country where the government imposes extremely strict regulations, it can be harder to enforce rules and support certain gamblers. Problem gambling affects up to 400,000 people in the UK, and is the key focus area for the government when it comes to the disadvantages of legal gambling. As well as government-funded support groups and other help and advice services that operate in conjunction with the gambling commission, there are strictly enforced rules that gaming companies need to abide by when it comes to preventing problem gambling. In a different era, the person who gambles their entire fortune would be a key customer for a casino, but now casinos have to, by law, help problem gamblers stop themselves from gambling too much.

In a physical casino, this could include refusing entry, offering self-exclusion, refusing to accept any further wagers, or even ejecting an individual from the premises. This is a lot easier to enforce with trained staff who know how to handle problem gambling with sensitivity, or at least security staff who can help to enforce self-exclusion. For gambling websites, it’s a little harder to enforce these rules, and a lot of time and effort goes into creating systems that help to combat gambling addiction. Leading online casino providers use a combination of customer tracking, account management, self-exclusion tools and support options to help those with a gambling addiction to stop altogether, or reduce their gambling to a manageable amount. Online casinos that look after their customers are considered to be the most trustworthy and are generally very successful, here is a fine example of a responsible gaming online casino. A huge focus is on preventing vulnerable people, including children, from accessing their gaming services, the best online casinos fully comply with advertising and gambling addiction regulations set out by the government. With a bit of investment, and a willingness to comply, the problem can be managed at the source, creating a safe and fun gambling environment online that can effectively manage problem gaming.

The other key aspect that interests the government is naturally the tax revenues that can be collected from the private companies operating within the gambling industry. For online casinos, this is the single biggest outgoing, with staffing and licensing costs a close second. Gaming duty can be anything from 15% all the way to 50% depending on the size of the company, premises, or revenues. For a high profile online casino, this will be closer to 50% than 15%. With profits often cut in half, the big advantage for online casino providers is the fact that they don’t have to pay for premises, which can be a huge outgoing for traditional casino operators.

Mergers and Acquisitions

Making a deal

Mergers and acquisitions are common in every industry, none more so than the gambling industry. Paddy Power, founded in 1998, successfully rose from the ground to being Europe’s biggest bookie in 2011. They started with shops and telephone betting, before eventually branching out with their online betting ventures. Starting out at a similar time, Betfair was established in 2000 and focused purely on online gambling. Both companies spotted the opportunity for growth, and in February 2016 Paddy Power Betfair was established, the merger was worth $5 million and they now own 16% of the gambling industry in the UK. The merger can certainly be considered a success; the company grew by 18% in 2016.

In recent news, it looks as though Stars Group, a gambling company based in Canada, are going to complete the purchase of Sky Bet for $4.7 billion. This will soon be the biggest online gaming company in the world. Stars Group have certainly been busy, they recently announced acquisitions of both William Hill Australia and a share in CrownBet.

Controversy in the Industry

Controversy definition

In January of this year, five UK-facing online gambling operators were under severe pressure from the authorities, they were under threat of losing their licenses due to their inability to be responsible for their players and not doing enough to guard against money laundering. Clearly, money laundering is one of the industry’s biggest issues and there is now increased pressure on online casinos to ensure it doesn’t happen on their watch. UK gambling regulations suggest that all licensed operators must conduct assessments of risk for the possibility of their site being used money laundering and terrorist financing, the five gambling operators were accused of not carrying out these assessments to an adequate level.

Looking to the Future

A man and a woman looking at a computer screen

The future of casino gaming looks very promising too. As well as the growth figures that prove that the remote industry is slowly but surely overtaking the land-based one, the fact that over 9 in 10 adults now have access to a smart device is a big opportunity for online casinos. With a 2017 relaxation from the Apple and Google app stores, which finally allowed online casino providers to offer their apps for download, accessing casino gaming has quite literally never been easier.

The big challenge however is surviving in an economy where disposable incomes are getting smaller each year. With Brexit looming and confidence in the economy still down, the tendency to save rather than spend could be hampering how much people are willing to spend on gambling. This will certainly be a key consideration in the strategies of all gaming companies, but they shouldn’t be too worried. Gambling, after all, is pretty recession-proof, and there’s plenty of history that says gambling will continue to be lucrative no matter what happens – after all, we all like a wager don’t we?

Tags: gamblingonline casino industryUK
Share86Tweet54
Previous Post

Unveiling Our 2018 Live And Invest Overseas Conference Calendar

Next Post

3 Reasons To Join Us And Experience Paris This Fall

Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord

Kathleen Peddicord has covered the live, retire, and do business overseas beat for more than 30 years and is considered the world's foremost authority on these subjects. She has traveled to more than 75 countries, invested in real estate in 21, established businesses in 7, renovated historic properties in 6, and educated her children in 4.

Kathleen has moved children, staff, enterprises, household goods, and pets across three continents, from the East Coast of the United States to Waterford, Ireland... then to Paris, France... next to Panama City, where she has based her Live and Invest Overseas business. Most recently, Kathleen and her husband Lief Simon are dividing their time between Panama and Paris.

Kathleen was a partner with Agora Publishing’s International Living group for 23 years. In that capacity, she opened her first office overseas, in Waterford, Ireland, where she managed a staff of up to 30 employees for more than 10 years. Kathleen also opened, staffed, and operated International Living publishing and real estate marketing offices in Panama City, Panama; Granada, Nicaragua; Roatan, Honduras; San Miguel de Allende, Mexico; Quito, Ecuador; and Paris, France.

Kathleen moved on from her role with Agora in 2007 and launched her Live and Invest Overseas group in 2008. In the years since, she has built Live and Invest Overseas into a successful, recognized, and respected multi-million-dollar business that employs a staff of 35 in Panama City and dozens of writers and other resources around the world.

Kathleen has been quoted by The New York Times, Money magazine, MSNBC, Yahoo Finance, the AARP, and beyond. She has appeared often on radio and television (including Bloomberg and CNBC) and speaks regularly on topics to do with living, retiring, investing, and doing business around the world.

In addition to her own daily e-letter, the Overseas Opportunity Letter, with a circulation of more than 300,000 readers, Kathleen writes regularly for U.S. News & World Report and Forbes.

Her newest book, "How to Retire Overseas: Everything You Need to Know to Live Well (for Less) Abroad," published by Penguin Random House, is the culmination of decades of personal experience living and investing around the world.

Related Posts

Harbour and medieval castle in Kyrenia, North Cyprus
Europe

Cyprus Real Estate: The Hidden Treasure Of The Mediterranean

by Lief Simon
June 17, 2022
0

A few weeks ago I shared some of my first impressions of Cyprus, and since then we’ve put the reservation...

Read more
Redhead woman observing the sunset in Porto, Portugal on the bridge over the river

5 Reasons I Chose Living In Portugal Over Anywhere Else

March 31, 2022
Historic town of Perast at Bay of Kotor in summer, Montenegro

The Top 8 Affordable Retirement Options In Europe

November 10, 2021
Paris, France life in europe

What You Need To Know Before Starting A New Life In Europe

October 29, 2021
Beautiful vineyards in the town of Arbois in France

Arbois, France: A Place With Friendly Locals And Beautiful Surroundings

October 21, 2021
Varenna, small town on lake Como, Italy

The Cost Of Living In Europe Is Lower Than You Think

October 10, 2021
Panorama of Stockholm, Sweden

The Top 11 Reasons To Live In Europe

October 8, 2021
Next Post
France is a rent overseas must.

3 Reasons To Join Us And Experience Paris This Fall

Start Your New Life Today, Overseas

A world full of fun, adventure, and profit awaits! Sign up for our free daily e-letter, Overseas Opportunity Letter, and we’ll send you a FREE report on the 10 Best Places To Retire In Style Overseas Today.







LIOS Resources


  • New To LIOS
  • Ask An Expert
  • Media Center
  • Contact Us
  • FAQs

Quick Links


  • Best Places To Live
  • Best Places To Retire
  • Finding A Job Overseas
  • Real Estate

Sign up for our free daily e-letter, Overseas Opportunity Letter, and get your FREE report: The 10 Best Places To Retire Overseas In 2022

  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms
  • Unsubscribe

© 2008-2021 - Live and Invest Overseas - All Rights Reserved.

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Countries
  • Budgets
  • Archives
  • News
  • Events
  • Bookstore
  • Newsletters
  • About Us
  • Members Area
  • Contact Us

© 2008-2021 - Live and Invest Overseas - All Rights Reserved.

Sign up for FREE and learn how to live the good life on a modest budget, find bargain property, and more. Plus, check out our free report on the 10 BEST PLACES TO RETIRE.

RETIRE OVERSEAS AND LIVE LIKE ROYALTY

The World’s Best Places To Be In 2022?

Discover Them Here…