2024 will be a market consolidation year, with the tech challenges the affiliate industry will face, some might want to sell, and the biggest affiliate have bank facilities (50M secured at GDC) and others have raised, allowing them to make moves.
TGC Writing Team.
iGaming Operators News
SPORTS BETTING OPERATORS
- Codere : Mexico becomes its biggest market after 2023 surge, after a 40% increase in full year revenue.
- Australian AML places Bet365 under investigation. AUSTRAC said it had “reasonable grounds to suspect” that the operator had fallen foul of AML/CTF obligations, the operator has to appoint an external auditor and provide a report within 180 days.
- UEFA criticized for Euro 2024 sponsorship deal with Betano. The Alliance Against Sport Betting Advertising has accused both UEFA and governmental authorities of failing to adequately address the issue of problem gambling.
- Betclic attack on FDJ’s goal to acquire Kindred : “ We don’t see how a company having a monopoly can acquire a competitor that has important market shares on the same markets”.
- Bet-at-home registered disappointing results. The german bookmaker of Betclic saw its revenues decreased by 14% (36M€) & its EBITDA by 62% (800K€), mainly due to the betting limit imposed by german regulator.
- PMU joins AFJEL in order to lobby, with the idea in mind to impact the regulation on Online Casino.
- Betsson Head of Affiliates points Europe and LatAm as their main targets. The bookie arrived recently in France.
- Betway, re-evaluate its presence in the US after a 57M€ loss for the FY2023.”it’s important to us that we are constantly evaluating and re-evaluating what we’ve invested in the market, and ultimately how we can get to a profitable, sustainable business.”
CASINOS OPERATORS
- 888 Holdings are set to exit the US at a cost of $50M. The group notified its investors that it has begun a strategic review of its US B2C ops, mainly due to profits margins quite low.
- Is online casino cannibalising land based casinos operations ? Not sure. Studies says that operators in the US offering both “have not observed cannibalization”. In Belgium, Philippe Bon, CEO of Casinos de France, said that went the vertical regulated, land-based casinons GGR fell and recovered.
- Entain reports £878.9M loss for the FY2023 (whole group). The company setted up a committee in order to review brands per markets, some might be killed, with the aim of refining organizational focus, enhancing competitive standing, and optimizing shareholder value
- Alabama State passed a pair of bills that would see lottery and state-regulated gambling legalised, but sports betting have been excluded. Either land-based and online.
LOTTERY, BINGO & SLOTS
- Lottoland received long term German licence for the brokerage of state lotteries. They will also soon get the sports betting and virtual slot machine licenses.
iGaming Affiliates News
Company Results
- GDC announced a new credit of 50M$, supposed helping them to continue their growth (organic and inorganic). The company will also disclose its FY 2023 results 21 mars 2024, looking promising, with 108M$ for the full year (+42%). They forecast at least 129M$ for an EBITDA of 44M$ for 2024. NA representing 20.3M$ (rose by 103% in the year)
- Catena Media published its FY 2023 reports. It was a “organisational transformation”, were it lead to a decrease of 22% in revenue (76M€) and -47% in adjusted EBITDA. For the Full year, the affiliate counted 184.257 FTDs.
- BetterCollective published its FY 2023 results. And for the first time, they focused on the tech advantages (such as AdVantage) and its efficiency in rankings, audiences and costs optimization.
General News
- FairPlay Sports Media (ex-Oddschecker) launched a bet builder comparison tool through oddschecker brand in the UK. The tool will allow users to find the best prices and offers for complex same-game multiple bets. At launch, the bet builder prices will focus on prices from Bet365, BetMGM, Sky Bet, Paddy Power and Speadex.
- IGB Affiliate released its Affiliate Monitor for February. As a summary: → Daly insinuate that GiG uses AskGamblers on black/grey market, what they strongly refused to do when it as Catena’s asset.
- Catena Media hires Manuel Stan as new CEO, a week after Davy’s departure. Stan comes from 16 years at Kindred Group where he led marketing teams and served as Senior VP.
- 10 iGaming affiliates sites have been approved to display the QMRA badge since its launch in January. Among them : casinosherlock.com, Betterworldcasinos.com, casinohacks.com , mywettanbieter.de, kickfieber.de, mysportwetten.de and mywettbonus.de, gamblorium.com/se and casinotopplistan.com
- Checkd Group launched Digital PR Team to propel brand visibility, aiming the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, and South America, with a dual focus on enhancing organic search performance and providing digital PR services to partners..
Interviews
- SBCNews got an interview with Catie di Stefano, Director of Community Marketing at OnlineGamblers.com. In the main things to keep from this interview, Catie says US take longer to make results with higher costs, with specific betting behaviors states by states. She also mentions the difficulties for affiliates to offer localised contents for readers…Then, they discussed the alternative channels the affiliates uses to push its offers, such as videos.
- Comparasino’s MD talks about the limits of the UK’s regulation on online casino, and the onboarding processes that could lead toward unlicensed operators.
- FairPlay Sport Media (former Oddschecker) CEO discusses the need for affiliates to innovate before they die. He categorizes the affiliates in three parts:
- The ‘dumb pipe’, a digital property that shows affiliate links with no content or context to the product or service they represent
- the ‘intelligent and informative’ sites which utilise some form of expertise and content to acquire, attract, and sometimes retain customers.
- the ‘customer of the brands’ service is one that speaks from experience, offering trusted reviews and insights of a service
- BC’s CEO got interviewed by EGR on the story of BC, since the affiliate’s approaching its 20 years anniversary.
Market Moves
NEWS FEED
- Kalen Bushe, VP at TrafficGuard discusses how bookies can beat the competition in the US. The main issue is first, having the visibility they need to convert players; but then, it opens up a brand new challenge with the invalid traffic (Invalid traffic is engagement that artificially inflates an advertiser’s costs, including non-human traffic, or activity designed to produce fraudulent impressions.). Those fake users can go even more further by signing-up and taking bonuses… Making the acquisitions costs very high.
- Richard Metcalf, Global VP Sports Betting & Online Gaming at TrafficGuard discusses the rise of female bettors and its impact on the marketing campaign. The % of women betting on women sports in the US has grown up to 10% annually and The Sports Betting Report revealed that 26% of American Women bet daily. This emerging market (within an emerging market) also requires thinking on loyalty program for operators.
- What it’s like to enter the US Market ? Not only the regulation is a challenge, but labour union is also a concern. All eyes are turned to Maryland and Maine for this year.
- Sportradar integrates new in-play betting features into… NBA League Pass on legalized states.
- Peru’s Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourisme received 145 requests for Operator licenses over the first 30 days after the law came into effect and more than 180 applications for technological platforms and game providers. Operators had until March 10 to submit their application.
M&A Moves
- GRV Media acquired bloodyelbow.com. The affiliates, known for launching from scratch its assets, strengthen its fighting assets with the acquisition of this powerful asset. Amount was not disclosed but have been made thanks to weBrokr.
- NSN acquired Sportsmole . Check the press release on IGB Affiliates
- Already Media acquires Pokerlistings from Acroud, since it’s not in the company strategy anymore. The amount was not disclose.
- Betano and Romanian Football Federation extend their partnership until 2030, after a first deal that helped the Cupa Romaniei Betano grow
- Betsson sport partners with Totti to launch italian market.
- GDC (Gambling.com) to acquire European and Canadian assets from XLMedia for a total amount of 42.5M$. The deal is supposed to be conclude in April.
SEO/SEA/PPC
- DeepCI released 2 infographics showing the differences in operator brands on affiliate websites in Peru and Chile… With no surprise, Bet365 and Betano are leading, but could you guess other differences?
Regulatory Updates
🇺🇸
USA
- North Carolina issues eight online sports betting licences. Among those, Fanduel, Draftkings, Fanatics, Bet365, BetMGM, ESPN Bet and Underdog are set to launch in the state
- Rhode Island becomes seventh US state to launch iGaming. Bally’s Corporation launched on 5 mars 2024 with about 170 slot games. **Concerning the regulation, geolocation technologies will be used to ensure the player is in the state. That means that affiliate content must also be geolocated.**
🇧🇪
Belgium
The Belgium Gaming Commissions confirmed that the legal age for all forms of gambling will increase from 18 to 21 from September 1st 2024 and bonuses are also set to be banned.The changes include:
- New prohibition of devices as set out in section ‘3.3’ of the ACT
- Multiple gaming licenses for one website no longer allowed
- A complete ban on gifts, bonuses, and free games
- Advertising games of chance is now banned
- Age limit of 21 years
🇵🇭
Montenegro
An amendment of Montenegro’s gambling law will change the payments method authorized. It’s planned to forbid ebanking and mobile payments, so bettors would have to place monetary cash or card through a betting shop
🇬🇮
Gibraltar
FATF whitelisted Gibraltar, after having clear acknowledgment of Gibraltar’s progress in AML/CTF matters.
🇧🇷
India
- Taxes on gambling are still a big matter in the country, making it hard for operators to forecast their investments. At first, it was called the GST (high as 28% of all bets), but lobbies worked hard to make it change, leading to a 28% on first time deposit. Nevertheless, operators such as Betway decided to pull out of the market.
🇵🇪
Peru
Online Gambling Market came into law on March 10. A tax rate of 12% of GGR have been set for operators as of 1 April.
🇨🇴
Colombia
According to the management against Illegal Operations attached to Coljuegos, 14 570 orders to block online betting sites have been issued.