How regulations paved the way to success for Colombia?

BtoBet, a pioneer in the sports betting and online casino technology solutions, released a report about igaming regulation in Colombia.

Colombia is a country located in the north of South America. It has a population of 50 million people with a pure passion for sports and gaming.

In addition, Colombia’s economy is considered one of the most successful in the region, especially when one takes into account the fact that almost 80% of the population is under 54 years of age.

However, in order to set the prime example for other countries in Latin America on how to successfully develop the iGaming industry, Colombia had to undergo a long period of transition. One of the main reasons why the country needed a proper regulatory framework is underlined by the fact that operators were being fined by the country for providing gambling services without a proper license, despite not having a clearly defined licensing procedure.

Luckily, the Colombian government in 2015 joined forces with the regulatory body assigned to this industry – EICE Coljuegos in order to resolve this pressing issue. By the end of the same year, regulations were drafted, they contained the new standards regarding games and gambling technologies that the operators were required to follow in order to acquire the license.

It wasn’t until October 2016 that the eGaming Act was passed and since then operators were able to offer gaming and betting services to the Colombian players, with the tax being set at 15% on gross wins for the operators with an additional 1% tax paid to Coljuegos.

Ever since the regulatory framework was established, both the government and Coljuegos were working towards attracting both local and global operators in order to expand the betting options for the players. Apart from this, they also aimed towards blocking illegal operators, as according to the regulatory body only last year 4,332 illegal games were withdrawn from the market, which represents a 14,8% increase in comparison to 2017-18. Such actions have played a major role in protecting the players from being scammed by illegal operators who can significantly hurt the industry’s growth.

This process of establishing the regulatory framework has been the key factor in developing a successful iGaming industry in Colombia. Additionally, it is not only the proper regulations that are attracting operators but the strong technological infrastructure as well.

The country’s internet penetration is sitting at 69% as mobile connectivity is around 119%. In terms of devices, the smartphone is dominating this segment as 93% of the users choose it to gain access to the internet. Over the past couple of years, there were several impactful investments in the infrastructure, resulting in an increased average speed of mobile connections (18.71MBPS) and average speed of fixed internet connection (28.32MBPS).

This perfectly showcases the signs that the market is slowly shifting towards remote forms of gambling, this matter is furthermore underlined by Coljuegos’ tax revenues for the year ending 31st October 2019, with online channels registering steady growth on a yearly basis.

Аnother proof of the staggering impact the regulations have on the iGaming industry is the average expenditure per user per annum which according to the regulatory body in Colombia rose from 20$ in 2015 to 94$ in 2017, this figure is expected to triple by 2021.

It goes without saying that the Colombian iGaming industry is set to go nowhere but forward.