UK iGaming Industry Sees Rapid Growth
On the whole, the United Kingdom gambling industry is experiencing healthy growth, with all sectors improving year on year. The UK Gambling Commission latest numbers show that Total Gross Gambling Yield (GGY) for April 2017 – March 2018 reached £14.4bn, which is a 4.5% increase on the last period.
The iGaming or Remote sector accounted for 37.3% of the entire gambling market. A lot has been said and written about thissectortaking over, and the latest figures are emphasising this point with the total iGaming Gross Gaming Yield rising to £5.4bn. This is a 13.7% rise when compared to the last period which refers to remote sports betting, casino and bingo. Thus showing the unrelenting dominance of the iGaming and tech side of the business, which is showing no signs of slowing down.
The majority of the £5.4bn recorded from Gross Gaming Yield in the online market came from casino activities. Casino as a sector is responsible for £2.9bn of the £5.4bn GGY, which means that income from this channel was worth 54.6% of the total. Furthermore, 3.1% of the total, or £164.8m, was from the bingo sector, with bingo continuing to more than hold its own in the iGaming market place.
What will come as no surprise is that of the online casino gross gaming yield, a staggering 69.1% was made up by slot games. Slots managed to generate £2bn, with table games the second highest contributor with a total yield of £311.1m.
Slots have been instrumental in the rapid growth of the iGaming industry, especially as more and more gamers are now opting to enjoy them via their smartphones on the go. This has been reflected by the growing influence of companies who specialise in the mobile sphere, like InTouch Games, who also have plans to explore international markets.
Land based casinos are still performing admirably too, despite the iGaming revolution. Casinos saw a gross gaming yield rise of 2.4% to £1.2bn, which isn’t bad at all. Genting UK and Rank Group dominate the land-based casino market in England, Scotland and Wales, with 72% of operational venues ran by them. There are currently 152 casinos active across the three nations, with them more than holding their own in the entertainment sector.
At land-based casinos, American roulette proved to be the most popular game, holding a 34.7% share of the GGY. It was Punto Banco, which is a variant of Baccarat which held the second largest share of 24.9%, while electronic gaming at land-based casinos was responsible for a 17.4% share of the GGY.
There was also slight growth reported for land-based bingo too, with a climb of 0.2% recorded where the GGY was concerned. This saw the figure rise to £688.3m, which sees it move in the right direction once again. However, as mentioned above, it’s iGaming which is rapidly moving in the right direction as it continues to grow in all areas. It’s likely the next set of figures posted will show that is has claimed an even bigger share of the market, with increases recorded across the board once again.