Sweden’s Svenska Spel posts Q1 growth
Online gaming helped the state-owned gambling operator from Sweden post a first quarter growth.
Sweden.- Sweden’s gaming regulator, Lotteriinspektionen, released on Friday a report in which it was detailed that the local gambling market generated a turnover of US$618 million during the first quarter of 2018, a 2.8 per cent increase from the same period last year. Svenska Spel achieved good online results during the first three months of the year.
The state-owned gambling operator Svenska Spel’s total turnover was 1.4 per cent higher at US$253 million. The gambling monopoly’s online branch makes up less than 30 per cent of the total turnover but still drove the growth during the three-month period, as operations increased 24.8 per cent, while land-based turnover fell 6.1 per cent.
Mobile activity at Svenska Spel also increased 52 per cent year-on-year, mainly because the company released a new app for its Oddset sports betting offer, which managed to boost the number of sports markets to 21k, 11k more than last year.
Svenska Spel is getting ready to launch an online casino branch once the country’s new relaxed online market starts its regime in January 2019. Nevertheless, international companies are insisting that Svenska Spel’s digital division needs to be privatised in order to ensure a level playing field in the new market.
Last week, the gaming regulator revealed that international online gambling sites operating without permission keep improving their performance with double-digit revenue growth, while the domestic gambling market was flat in 2017.
The domestic market generated approximately US$2 billion in 2017, which is pretty much the same as the number reported in 2016. International licensed online gambling sites experienced a 14.6 per cent revenue growth to over US$6.7 billion, considerably more than the domestic market’s performance. International gambling sites held 53.3 per cent of the market in 2017, while they also have a 24.3 per cent of the overall Swedish gambling market, up from the 16.5 per cent registered in 2012.
