Every Portuguese spends 0.16 Euro daily in online gambling

The people in Portugal have spent a total of 160 million Euro for online gambling in three months. Consequently, according to statistics, this means that during the observation period, each of the 10.3 million Portuguese has lost 0.16 Euro daily in online gambling. This is the highest amount ever/ But how can one explain this increased interest in gambling by the Portuguese population?

Around two years ago we had reported about the anticipated ban on online gambling in Portugal and Sweden. As it was announced a few weeks ago, the people in Portugal spent a record sum for online gambling in the first quarter of 2022. The Portuguese have lost a total of 158.6 million in gambling from January to March 2022. When compared to the previous year, there is an impressive increase of 12.4 %. This can also be seen in the recent statistics of the competent Gambling Authority Serviço de Regulação e Inspeção de Jogos (SRJI).

People in Portugal gamble 1.7 million Euro daily

There are currently slightly more than 10.3 million people living in Portugal. This means that the population has lost 158.6 million Euro in gambling in the first quarter of the year. This comes up to a daily loss of nearly 1.7 million Euro. Or in other words: According to the statistics every Portuguese gambles away 0.16 Euro daily.

As a comparison: Every citizen of legal age in Ireland loses an average of 300 Euro in gambling per year. This is equivalent to a daily loss of over 0.83 Euro. However, one cannot really compare the two figures with each other, since the Irish statistic refers to all people over 18 and to all forms of gambling and not online gambling. Around a year ago exactly we had discussed the issue in an article, whether the Irish have a gambling problem

Portugal has already issued 26 licences for online gambling

Meanwhile the South European EU-State of Portugal has already issued 26 official licences for online gambling. 15 of these licences are casino licences and the 11 remaining licences are for sports betting. Since the online market has been liberalised, there has also been a drastic increase in sales. For this reason, it is expected that the player losses will be even higher in the future. In June of the past year we had reported about the business with gambling licences in Greece.

Sales have increased drastically since Corona pandemic

The sales in licensed online gambling have increased significantly since the beginning of the pandemic. In the first six months of 2020 the responsible Authority registered 40 % increase in sales, up to 138.9 million Euro. The sales of online casinos and online betting providers have increased significantly. The long and strict lockdowns in Portugal are the reason for this. The casinos and betting offices were affected by the imposed closures over several months, just like in other countries.

Conclusion

In the first quarter of 2022, every Portuguese had lost an average of 0.16 Euro daily in online gambling. This corresponds to a loss of around 4.80 Euro per month per Portuguese inhabitant. From January to March 2022, the people in Portugal have lost nearly 160 million Euro in online gambling – further increase is expected.

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