Svenska Spel Reports Strong Performance in Q1 of 2018

Swedish national gambling operator reports steady growth in Q1 of 2018.

Svenska Spel or widely known as the Swedish national gambling operator has noted strong Q1 performance in 2018 reveals a statistics report issued by the gambling regulator Lotteriinspektionen last Friday. Namely, Svenska Spiel noted a steady 1.4% growth y-o-y and reached land and online gambling turnover of SEK 2.1 billion. Sweden’s national gambling operations, altogether, have had a great first quarter too as they generated turnover of SEK 5.63 billion (around USD 618 million), which is higher y-o-y for 2.8%.

Locally licensed land-based and remote gambling activities achieved a 1.1% jump y-o-y as their turnover reached SEK 4.13 billion. Foreign licensed gambling companies operating in Sweden, on the other hand, noted turnover of SEK 1.5 billion i.e. a jump of impressive 15.3%. This figure also reveals that international operators hold a strong 27% share of the Swedish gambling market; this share is better for 4 points in comparison to the same period in 2017.

Online Gambling Activities Contribute for 30% of the Total Turnover of Svenska Spel

Svenska Spel reported to interesting key figures. Namely, the operator’s online gambling activities hold a strong share of the total turnover i.e. 30%. Digital operations noted a growth of 24.8% in the first three months of the year, whereas land-based operations fell for 6.1%.

Nevertheless, the most interesting change seems to be the impressive progress of mobile gambling. Believe it or not, this segment has achieved a growth of amazing 52%; according to experts, this is largely affected by the release of the new mobile app for the Oddset sports betting platform. This product saw a serious jump in customers too; this figure reached 21k in Q1 of 2018 from much more modest 10k in Q1 of 2017.

Soon, Svenska Spel will be able to launch an online casino vertical after the liberalization of the Swedish gambling market comes into effect in 2019. Nonetheless, the competitors of the gambling monopoly are still trying to push the Swedish government to privatise the digital division of Svenska Spel as that would guarantee level playing field in the future open gambling market.

Horserace Betting in the Positive, Lotteries in the Negative

When it comes to the rest of the gambling market in Q1 of 2018, horserace betting did quite good. The monopoly ATG performed good online and bad land-based. Therefore, the operator’s online betting jump was strong 11.3%, while its land-based operations fell for 7.8%. ATG’s digital sector is, however, much more important to the operator as it holds a strong 60% share of the total Q1 turnover of SEK 982 million.

Nevertheless, nothing did worse than the Swedish lottery. The major lottery operators all noted significant drops in turnover, with Postcode Lottery dropping for 12% to SEK 549 million. Folkspel and IOGT-NTO noted respective falls of 8% and 11.6%, whereas SAP-SSU generated only SEK 49 million; this figure is almost one-fifth lower than the one recorded in Q1 of 2017.