The UK government's decision to dramatically increase taxes on the gambling sector was extremely disappointing. It opens the door to the illegal black market who pay no tax, do not have a license, and have no player protections.
Online total Gross Gambling Yield (GGY) totalled £1.42 billion. That was a figure 8 percent higher than in the same period for the previous year. Real event betting GGY also increased with the total of £508 million being 12 percent up year-on-year. Despite those new stake limits, the GGY for online slots was up 9 percent to £747 million. The number of spins rose by 4% to 24.4 billion.
Online casinos and bookmakers will pay billions of pounds more in tax under a steep rise in duties levied on their takings from British gamblers. Shares in UK gambling firms began tumbling even before Rachel Reeves announced the change in her budget, after the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) which assesses the likely impact of tax changes accidentally published a document confirming that the industry had been singled out for higher taxes.