Online betting and gaming has been a large part of the UK gambling industry generating a record yield of £13.8 billion in the year ending September 2016, up from £13.4 billion generated in the year up to March 2016.For the second consecutive reporting period, online gambling was the largest sector, totalling £4.5 billion, up from £4.2 billion in the previous period, showing that online gambling was responsible for a large percentage of the overall increase.
History and law changes
Remote gambling has been regulated in the UK since the introduction of the Gambling Act 2005, and since that time, it has been a rough ride at times, but the growth of the industry has been stable in the 12 years since the inception of the Act, and continued to grow after amendments were made to the law in 2014 to require all operators offering services in the UK to have a license from the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC).In addition to this change, it also became law for all UK-facing operators, no matter where they are based, to pay a 15% share of their GGY in tax, something that has led to various mergers between high profile companies, most notably Ladbrokes and Gala Coral.
Growth
In the period from April 2013 to March 2014, the yield from the iGaming industry in the UK was £1.1 billion, the heavy increase since that time has seen the industry grow by more than £3 billion.During the latest period, iGaming accounted for 32% of the whole market. This can be put into perspective when compared to the yield from land based gambling machines and fixed odds betting terminals, which still make up a large percentage of total yield, but pale in comparison to iGaming, with these machines brining in £1.8 billion in the latest period.