Italy’s sports betting revenue dipped in the lead-up to the Fifa World Cup
Tansu Yilmaz
Italy’s igaming revenue in November dipped slightly to €322.5m in the lead-up to the Fifa World Cup, down from October’s revenue of €331.1m.
Since pushing past the €300m barrier in September 2022, Italy’s igaming revenue has remained relatively stable. Although November’s revenue of €322.5m does represent a 2.6% decline month-on-month, this is still a 6.0% increase year-on-year. The decline was mostly consistent across all verticals, although sports betting’s decline of 4.3% was the biggest drop for November, with revenue of €126.3m.
However, online sports betting still fared better than retail sports betting, which suffered a decline of 16.4% month-on-month, which is a decrease in revenue from €88.6m in October to €74.1m in November.
In contrast to the betting figures, casino revenues only dropped by 2.1% from €180.0m to €176.1m.
The market shares of online casino operators by GGR remained relatively stable in November, with Eurobet being the biggest mover as it was unable to hold on to the fifth place position it reached in October and has now dropped back to seventh biggest, with a market share of 6.1%. Lottomatica/Goldbet remains the largest with a total market share of 12.7%. A new arrival in the top 20 was Tombola International, which sits at a market share of 1.2% for November.
Online sports betting companies also had relatively stable market shares in November, with the biggest winner being Bet365 who moved up to an 11.4% market share from 9.7%, and the biggest loser being SKS365 who dropped from 10.5% to 9.5% market share. Lottomatica/Goldbet holds the top spot still at 15.7%, but Sisal is not far behind at 15.4%.
Looking at online and retail sports betting together, the biggest loser in market share was Lottomatica/Goldbet, coming down from 23.6% to 21.8%, however, this still leaves them far clear of second place Snai which holds 15.3% of the market share for the month.
Pokerstars’ market share for poker tournament play increased to 44.96% up from 40.58% in October. This represents the highest market share since April 2022 when they held 48.75% of the market share. In cash games, the increase was less substantial, as Pokerstars’ share increased to 40.32% from 39.66% in October. Both cash game and tournament market shares remained relatively stable month-to-month, although in cash games E-Play 24 did see a rather significant drop from 12.38% market share in October to 10.21% in November. The month did also see a new entry into the top 10 for poker cash games, as Microgame replaced Bgame in the tenth spot with a market share of 1.6%.
