The first online slots in Italy’s regulated dot.it gambling market launched this morning after licensed operators received their authorisations from regulator AAMS.
Fifty-three operators have been authorised to offer a total of 1,409 games. Market leader Lottomatica, which commanded more than 25% of the casino table games market ahead of today’s launch, is among the dot.it operators which went live this morning. Second-ranked bwin.party has also launched slots on its GiocoDigitale.it and bwin.it websites, as have 888 and William Hill.
Italian authorities are looking to revive a flagging market by bringing online slots within the remit of the regulated market, the offline form of which accounted for more than half of gambling spend in the country last year.
Ineffective IP blocks, higher taxes and a narrower choice of products and markets compared to offshore sites has seen Italy’s dot.it gambling market, once the model for European countries looking to regulate their online markets, stagnate and decline in recent months. According to the last set of figures from Italian regulator AAMS, revenues from Italy’s dot.it ring-fenced market were down 11.3% year-on-year in August, despite the injection of cash poker and casino table game revenues from July 2011.
As well as leaving Italy’s slots market in the hands of offshore sites which are not licensed and regulated by Italian authorities, resulting in lower tax revenues for the Italian government, Italy’s licensed operators have also long argued that the high turnover tax for sports betting with no slots to mitigate risk has stalled the development of the regulated betting market.
Italian authorities have also approved the launch of a range of other products aimed at boosting the attractiveness of betting on regulated sites for Italian punters, with exchange betting, fast-fold poker, virtual betting and expanded range of game types and jackpots for online bingo among the new products in the pipeline.
The Italian casino table games market is currently dominated by local incumbents, led by Lottomatica. However, William Hill and 888 have made promising incursions into the market over the last 12 months, Hill’s cementing a top 5 spot in August with 7.3% market share, positioning itself to take advantage of the slots launch.
Article written by Stephen Carter
