Local gambling revenues languish in Sweden

Year-to-date figures released Thursday by Swedish gambling regulator Lotteriinspektionen show that local operators continued to lose out to international rivals in terms of revenue growth.

Continuing the nine-month long trend, Lotteriinspektionen reported that Sweden’s overall gambling turnover up to end September this year showed a 1.2 percent improvement compared to the same period a year ago, reaching SEK 16.8 billion (US$1.87 billion)

Swedish licensed operators saw declining sales by 2.4 percent to SEK12.24 billion, in growth terms trailing behind the international sites accessing the market, which achieved a 12.4 percent rise in sales to SEK 4.54 billion.

Notably, that 2.4 percent decline was double that reported in the first quarter this year.

Svenska Spel sales fell 1.6 percent to SEK 6.4 billion and occurred mainly in the terrestrial business of the state-owned monopoly where a 9.4 percent fall saw sales reach SEK 2.45 billion. Digital operations enjoyed more success, rising 22.5 percent to SEK 1.94 billion.

Racing monopoly AB Trav and Galopp (ATG) delivered marginally declining sales down 0.4 percent at SEK 3.05 billion with digital turnover up 6.7 percent at SEK 1.88 billion besting land turnover that dipped 10 percent to SEK 1.17 billion.

On the Swedish lottery front, Postcode Lottery sales declined 5.1 percent to SEK 1.61 billion, and People Games dipped 1.3 percent at SEK 345 million, with lesser lotteries all in double digit decline territory in terms of sales.

Peoples Games lottery at least had the distinction of being the only one to show an increase in online sales, which contribute just 10 percent of its total sales.

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