Revenues from the regulated egaming sector in Italy grew 2% in 2012, as the contribution from newer products offset a serious widespread contraction of the dot.it market during the second half of the year.
Total gross gaming revenue from gambling on poker, sports, casino table games, bingo and other products in Italy’s dot.it ring-fenced market was up 1.9% to €749.1m from €735.4m, according to data published today by Italian regulator AAMS.
The year-on-year increase was attributable to a full-year’s contribution from cash poker and casino table games, which were only introduced in July 2011, providing favourable full-year comparatives. Online slots, finally authorised at the start of December 2012, also made a strong early contribution, boosting online casino revenues by more than 40% on the previous month to €18.9m, up 74% year-on-year.
But casino was the only product group to grow revenues during the second half of 2012, as all other products drove a sustained overall decline. Dot.it revenues in the months since AAMS published its last set of figures for August sustained year-on-year declines of 28% in September, 15% in October, 6.2% in November and 6.3% in December.
In casino, Lottomatica maintained their market lead following the slots launch, albeit with a far smaller market share - 20.3% compared to more than 25% in August when AAMS published its last figures. bwin.party however lost its second place in the market to SNAI, as its share fell to 9.4% from 12.3% in August (see below for more detail).
In bingo, revenues continued to tumble, ending 2012 some 22.1% down on 2011 at €42.8m , hindered by a prohibitive turnover tax. UK-based Tombola continued to make inroads amid this decline, claiming 14.9%, of the market in December, up from 11.8% in August, establishing it as the second largest online bingo operator.
In the erratic fixed odds sports betting market, which has struggled to gain traction against offshore sites due to a high turnover tax and a limited choice choice of betting events and markets, GGR ended the year 20% down at €166.9m, not helped by sports betting operators returning an overall loss of €624,000 in September.
Lottomatica also saw its lead in sports betting dwindle in the second half of 2012, down to 21.3% by December, impacted by the successful entry of Paddy Power and William Hill to the market. The Irish bookie and Hill’s claimed respective market shares of 5.1% and 3.2% in December.
Italy online casino, sports betting and bingo market – December 2012 (% share of GGR)
Casino games – leading operators**
Lottomatica (including Totosi.it) – 20.3%
SNAI 11%
bwin.party (including bwin, Gioco Digitale and PartyCasino.it) – 9.4%
Sisal 9.1%
William Hill – 7.1%
(888 – 5.4%)
Fixed-odds sports betting – leading operators**
Lottomatica (including Totosi.it) – 21.3%
SNAI – 11.3%
bwin.party (bwin.it and GiocoDigitale.it) – 10.3%
Sisal – 9.5%
Eurobet - 7.4%
Bingo – leading operators**
bwin.party (including GiocoDigitale.it) – 24.8%
Lottomatica (including Totosi.it) – 17.2%
Tombola – 14.9%
Sisal – 9.7%
SNAI – 7.4%
**Calculations by Casino Choice based on AAMS data
Article written by Stephen Carter
