{"id":17124,"date":"2021-04-22T16:05:42","date_gmt":"2021-04-22T16:05:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/?p=17124"},"modified":"2026-04-23T20:09:47","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T23:09:47","slug":"racing-victoria-sees-record-growth-thanks-to-digital-wagering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/racing-victoria-sees-record-growth-thanks-to-digital-wagering","title":{"rendered":"Racing Victoria reports record growth thanks to digital wagering"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Racing Victoria has reported record wagers of AU$5m (US$3.9m) between August 2020 and January 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Australia.-\u00a0<strong>Racing Victoria Limited<\/strong>, the governing body for thoroughbred horseracing in Victoria, has reported that wagers on the sport <strong>totalled more than AU$5m (US$3.9m) <\/strong>during the first half of its 2020\/21 financial year. The number represents a 33 per cent increase compared to the previous period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The growth was<strong>\u00a0fueled by an increase in online gambling<\/strong>, which accounted for 86.5 per cent of wagers, <strong>up 75 per cent from the prior-year period<\/strong>. Retail wagers fell by 12 per cent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The turn towards digital wagering was\u00a0<strong>due to the Covid-19 restrictions\u00a0<\/strong>as pubs and TAB outlets were forced to close for much of 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The country\u2019s most famous horseracing meeting, the\u00a0<strong>Melbourne Cup<\/strong>, which\u00a0<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/melbourne-cup-to-held-without-spectators\">was held without spectators<\/a>, saw a record turnover of AU$221.6m,\u00a0<strong>up 17.3 per cent from the 2019 event<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Anti-gambling group campaigns to end sports betting ads<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Alliance for Gambling Reform (AGR) has claimed that sports wagering was the fastest-growing form of gambling in the country during the last year, and put the <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/australia-group-relaunches-campaign-for-ban-on-sports-betting-ads\">blame on sports betting ads<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">According to the&nbsp;<strong>Australian Gambling Research Centre (AGRC)<\/strong>,&nbsp;<strong>one in three participants in a survey of 2,000 opened a new online betting account<\/strong>&nbsp;during the Covid-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Brent Jackson<\/strong>, chief executive of corporate bookmaker lobby group&nbsp;<strong>Responsible Wagering Australia<\/strong>, denied AGR accusations and&nbsp;<strong>claimed the issue was non-existent<\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Racing Victoria has reported record wagers of AU$5m (US$3.9m) between August 2020 and January 2021.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":176,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"is_press_release":false,"is_interview":false,"is_opinion":false,"focusai_summary":"Racing Victoria reported record wagers of AU$5m for H1 FY2020\/21, a 33% increase, primarily driven by a 75% surge in online gambling, which constituted 86.5% of total wagers due to COVID-19 restrictions. This digital shift, exemplified by the Melbourne Cup's record AU$221.6m turnover, has intensified the debate around sports betting advertising, with anti-gambling groups attributing growth to ads while industry bodies dispute the claim.","focusai_entities":"Racing Victoria Limited, Alliance for Gambling Reform (AGR), Australian Gambling Research Centre (AGRC), Responsible Wagering Australia, Brent Jackson","focusai_location":"Australia, Victoria","focusai_target_profile":"ceo_executive (0.9), regulator (0.9), compliance_legal (0.85), operator_casino (0.9), affiliate_publisher (0.75), marketing_crm (0.8), investor_analyst (0.9), supplier_vendor (0.7), journalist_researcher (0.9)","focusai_suggestions":[{"label":"Online Growth Sustainability","query":"What specific regulatory or market interventions are anticipated to address the accelerated shift to online wagering and the contentious role of advertising, post-COVID-19?"},{"label":"Retail Recovery Strategy","query":"How are retail wagering operators planning to mitigate the 12% decline in wagers and recapture market share as COVID-19 restrictions ease, given the entrenched digital shift?"}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[16336,155],"tags":[233,23935],"class_list":["post-17124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-australasia-news","category-sports-betting-news","tag-sports-betting","tag-sportsbook"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/176"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17124"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17124\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17148,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17124\/revisions\/17148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/focusgn.com\/asia-pacific\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}