Based on a national sample of 2,199 adults, the AGA said 20% of American adults will place at least one bet on the game between the Philadelphia Eagles and Kansas City Chiefs this weekend.
This would be a 61% increase on the record set in 2022, while the AGA also said the amount wagered by players is expected to more than double year-on-year.
Total handle for the month was comfortably ahead of $426.6m in December 2021 but was down 3.0% from $518.8.m in November of 2022.
Adjusted gross gaming revenue for December – total wagers minus winnings, bonuses and promotions and other authorised deductions – rocketed by 365.4% to $10.1m, although this was 11.0% behind $52.8m in November.
Players in the state will be able to place bets on a wide range of sports via Betfred’s online sportsbook, with Virginia becoming the ninth state in which the operator is active in the US.
Customers will also have access to the Betfred Rewards scheme.
The past year proved to be a transformational 12 months for the business, which rebranded from Penn National Gaming in August to, what the operator said, would better represent both its past and future.
The name change was announced alongside its first-half results, with which chief executive Jay Snowden outlined actions it may take – including potential layoffs – in the event that economic conditions hurt its business. The warning came shortly before Penn exercised an option to acquire all remaining shares of media brand Barstool Sports.
In his new role, Grimshaw will oversee the expansion of technology-based solutions to Checkd’s media and operator partners across both the UK and North America.
Grimshaw joins Checkd after a spell as business development director at FSB Technology, prior to which he spent over three and a half years as digital sales manager at SIS.
Earlier in his career, Grimshaw also served in development-focused roles with Return, Play, Songkick, Box Productions, Amaze and Latitude Digital Marketing, as well as marketing positions at Digital Programmes and iTouch.
In addition, he spent time as a strategic account business manager at Manchester United.
“Checkd Group as a whole has made great progress in recent years with a roster of clients that speaks for itself,” Grimshaw said. “Their approach to technology-based solutions is cutting-edge, ultra reliable and delivers rapid revenue growth opportunities for operators and I am delighted to become part of the team.
“With the launch of a brand new sports betting app in the United States on the horizon, this is a great time to have joined Checkd Dev and I look forward to showing partners old and new exactly what we have to offer.”
Checkd Dev managing director Adam Patton added: “Our Checkd Dev division continues to go from strength to strength and given our ambitious plans on both sides of the Atlantic, this was the perfect moment to install a new commercial director to lead the way in forging new partnerships.
“Andrew is very well-known in the industry and possesses exactly the depth of knowledge that we were seeking for this position. His insight and expertise will be a massive boost in extending the delivery of our award-winning tech solutions.”
Micro betting is a subset of in-play wagering that allows players to wager on individual moments in a game in real-time. It offers the instant gratification / continuous betting opportunities of igaming but with the skill of sports betting.
Jump to:
In-play betting – Market potential
Micro betting – Market potential
Micro betting – Current performance
Micro betting could be a key driver to increase in-play wagering of US sports to levels of that seen in Europe for basketball and tennis, with the majority of wagering activity being incremental to existing spend.
Other benefits of a high frequency, low price sports betting product include:
Attracting a younger generation of customers that prefer less time commitmentIncreasing player engagement and therefore LTVsIncreasing spend of “casual” players – therefore reducing reliance on high-value players Creating new opportunities for operators to differentiate through product, marketing and promotionsReduced risk with far less margin variance on a daily basis due to exponentially more distinct timeframes as compared to spreads and totals
There is currently limited publicly available empirical data on the impact that micro betting is having on the US sports betting market, however anecdotal data suggests that operators are starting to view this as a material future growth driver.
One example of this is DraftKings’ expansion of micro betting to cover college football ahead of the 2022 season – on the opening weekend of season, this allowed users to bet on an “unprecedented 100,000 plays” across the 85 games.
PointsBet has also been a leading proponent of in-play betting, and micro betting in particular. In the company’s fiscal Q4 2022, the company stated that it generated 63% of handle from in-play betting in its North American business and expects 75% of handle to be generated by in-play in the US.
In terms of trying to quantify the potential for in-play betting, we look at our total sports betting market estimates for 2025 and take the low point of the 75%-85% of handle estimate of where we think that in-play could get to in the long-term. We then use the same margin differential for in-play / pre-match that has been reported in Oregon to estimate the resultant gross win.
US Sports Betting In-play Potential ($bn)
This suggests that in 2025, in-play could generate c.$117bn of handle and c.$9.0bn of gross win in the US.
The strong growth potential of in-play is now starting to come through in the most recent US data, with Genius Sports reporting significant growth from in-play in their latest results. In the first three weeks of the NFL season, the company has seen in-play handle increase by 70% YoY, leading to in-play GGR up 200% YoY – which has been the main driver in overall US revenue growth of 70% YoY.
The potential of micro betting is more difficult to estimate – not least because the definition of micro betting is still up for debate. For example, in tennis would micro betting be classified as wagering on the next point, or would it include wagering on the next game, or even the next set – i.e. anything less than the end result? In basketball would it be the next basket, or the next quarter, or the next half?
Depending on your view of the above, the micro betting market size potential varies significantly. As an example:
c.5% of in-play tennis wagering is on point betting, whereas 35% is on game betting and a further 20% is on set betting – so at one level micro betting could be said to account for c.5% of in-play tennis betting, or it could be said to account for c.60% of in-play tennis bettingin basketball, c.35% of wagers are not related to the full time result, but only c.2% are on player prop bets – however we do note that there is very little in the way of true micro betting markets in European basketball (i.e. next basket etc.)
Given that tennis is the only European product that currently has real micro betting markets, we use this as a proxy for the potential in US sports.
Data reported by a leading provider of micro betting markets shows that micro betting accounted for 14%-18% of in-play betting in 2021, reaching as high as 30% in college football. We use the 18% figure as the low-point of our analysis for the market potential, and the 30% achieved in college football as the mid-point. The high point of 45% is based on a 50% increase in that currently achieved in college football, given the relative immaturity of the product, and is a five-percentage point premium to the current point and game betting in European tennis. This broad range implies handle of $21bn to $52bn in 2025.
US Sports Betting Micro Betting Potential ($bn)
We then reduce the assumed hold margin, as in-play betting can include parlay wagers which are higher margin, and therefore micro betting is likely to have a lower hold margin than other products. At an assumed 7.1% hold margin, this equates to gross win of between $1.5bn and $3.7bn in 2025 – or a mid-point estimate of $2.5bn of gross win.
It is worth noting that due to the uniqueness of each sport there is room for even more upside. In addition to the start-and-stop cadence of US sports, there are for more variations of markets and selections for micro timeframes as compared to tennis. Each play can be a rush or pass, a first down, a sack, a touchdown etc.
It should also be noted that in-play / micro betting is not incompatible with the current operator focus on parlay betting. The most popular micro market for NFL is a four-selection Drive result market. The most popular Plate Appearance market for baseball is an eight-selection market including Homerun, Strikeout, etc.
Furthermore, when compared to global sports, US sports present unprecedented opportunities for micro timeframe player props as fans of these leagues are far more accustomed to tracking and predicting player performance. Predicting which player will record the next touchdown or 3-pointer, or whether a player will make or miss their next shot attempt could prove popular. By contrast, player prop markets don’t have the same potential in Europe, as soccer has fewer individual player prop betting opportunities.
While we are starting to see some early results in the US – which we examine below – micro betting on US sports presents both new challenges and new opportunities with the user-experience.
Data shared with H2 shows that a leading supplier of micro betting product in the US saw a 4x increase in the number of micro bets on the 2022 MLB season compared to the prior year, and a 2.5x increase in handle. Throughout the 2022 season, handle grew significantly month-by-month with September doing 3x that compared to April. MLB saw the most micro betting volume of any major US sport with Individual Pitch outcome markets accounting for over 40% of micro betting volume (despite offering far more markets on Plate Appearances and Half Innings).
Furthermore, over the season as a whole, it returned a hold margin of 8.0% – suggesting the potential market GGR could be even higher than H2 has estimated in this paper.
A leading micro betting supplier estimates that they currently account for c.20% of in-play handle for their sportsbook clients on the football season, with strong growth year on year, and strong week on week within the season. They also shared that markets for Drives accounted for over 80% of their micro betting volume with Next Play markets accounting for the rest. This is of particular interest as it contrasts with MLB, where the most micro timeframes (Pitches) seem to be driving more volume.
Hold margin improved from 5.4% in 2021 to c.9% in 2022, again suggesting further upside potential to H2’s market GGR estimate of $2.5bn.
A leading in-play supplier that has invested heavily into basketball micro markets shared that while micro betting is not currently as popular in basketball as other sports, this season has seen handle per match grow by 3.5x as compared to post all-star break of last season (the product was in beta pre all-star break). They estimated NBA micro markets account for roughly 7% of NBA live-betting handle for their clients with college basketball being closer to 10%.
Their margins for micro timeframe markets have been 6.6% and 8.3% for NBA and College Basketball respectively.
H2 Gambling Capital is widely recognised as the leading authority regarding market data and intelligence on the global gambling industry. Our team of analysts have been tracking the value of the sector since 2000.
The intelligence generated by H2’s industry forecasting model has become by far the most quoted source regarding the sector in published company reports, transaction documentation and sell-side analysts’ notes, as well as in the trade/business media.
The H2 Subscription service is used by the vast majority of the sector’s operators and suppliers; its major financial institutions, governments and regulators; and also, its media outlets in their benchmarking of performance to shareholders.
H2 North America is a new subscription service to cater for those specifically focused on the North American market.
H2 North America offers detailed data going back to 2003 / forecasts going out to 2027 on all aspects of the land-based and online gambling market, including detailed by-state monthly market share of the sports betting / igaming market, and financial models / news flow of over 80 companies across the gambling space. This new product also includes monthly and quarterly reports specifically focused on the North American sports betting and igaming market.
H2 is the lead data partner of Clarion Gaming and iGB.
The UK-headquartered media group, which also runs Teamtalk and PlanetF1.com, wants to develop the sports betting tips marketplace’s product suite and cross-promote the brand across its owned and operated titles.
It added that the acquisition will strengthen its ability to provide expert insights, live coverage and content across all major sports, both to its 20 million-strong monthly audience as well as its business-to-business clients.
Tipstrr operates a platform that aggregates, proofs and accredits sports betting tips, tracking historical profitability of selections.
“We have been following Tipstrr for a while and had previously identified them as a great fit to enhance Planet Sport’s D2C and B2B offerings in and around the sports betting market,” said Barrie Jarrett, chief executive of Planet Sport. “We are delighted to now welcome Damien Fearn and the great Tipstrr team to Planet Sport and we are looking forward to the acquisition delivering further growth for the business in 2023.”
Through the integration of Tipstrr’s tools, properties and attributes, Planet Sport said it aims to strengthen betting content, data product and its tech team. Planet Sport will also showcase its betting partners across Tipstrr.
“At Tipstrr we’ve always focussed on creating great products and tools in the sports betting industry,” said Fearn, founder of Tipstrr. “Joining Planet Sport allows us to reach a much wider audience and offer genuine value to more sports fans across the globe.
“The fit between the two companies was clear, even very early on in our discussions. The Tipstrr team and I are looking forward to growing as part of the Planet Sport network.”
The RG Check is a social responsibility accreditation that certifies igaming sites that have the tools to monitor and manage gambling harms.
The certification – which was awarded to Penn’s online gaming subsidiary Penn Interactive – was achieved after the operator underwent the RGC’s accreditation process.
Since it is not a regulatory requirement in the US where Barstool conducts the majority of its operation the process was undertaken on a voluntary basis.
“Penn is committed to being at the forefront of responsible gaming and achieving this accreditation for our online platforms further strengthens our top of class RG programme,” said Penn chief compliance officer Chris Soriano. “We have and will continue to be proactive by investing in valuable training and resources to ensure that we are providing the safest possible environment for players to responsibly enjoy gaming.
“Electing to undergo, and receiving accreditation following a thorough review of our operation, demonstrates that we’re actioning the highest standards of RG programming.”
The news follows the business’ Canadian subsidiary theScore Bet receiving the accreditation prior to its launch in Ontario – which the provincial regulator requires as a condition of licence.
RGC CEO Shelley White added: “RGC would like to congratulate Penn Interactive on achieving RG Check accreditation for Barstool Sportsbook and HollywoodCasino.com. This accomplishment re-affirms its commitment to player protections and, more importantly, making responsible gambling a priority in its operations.
“RG Check provides operators with invaluable insights into their RG programming and an actionable roadmap for continuous improvement. RGC is pleased to continue to support Penn Interactive’s harm minimisation efforts across jurisdictions.”
Lottoland was subject to the first German blocking order issued by the new regulator, due to its view that lottery betting was prohibited under Germany’s Fourth State Treaty on Gambling.
In a statement outlining its decision, the regulator said that Lottoland had represented a particular danger since the nature of the product may cause consumers to confuse the illegal offering with a legitimate lottery.
Following the regulator’s decision to impose the blocking order, it commanded an IP provider to block Lottoland’s online sites. The telecommunications company objected to this and sought a legal solution.
While initially the Koblenz Administrative Court did not intervene, on appeal, the higher court amended the decision and issued a directive stating that the blocking order should be suspended.
The court said that the order was “clearly unlawful”. In its reasoning, it stated that under the definition provided by the Telemedia act, the business was not a responsible service provider and so could not be commanded via the authority invested in the GGL.
Additionally, under German law the service provider is not responsible for any third-party content broadcast on its services unless transmitted by itself.
However, IP blocking is not the only tool open to the regulator. The GGL has, in the past, considered increased cooperation with the tax authorities or payment providers as other methods to reduce the activities of the illegal operators.
“The reporting of gambling providers to the responsible tax authorities is one of the most effective instruments for combating illegal gambling on the internet. Because, with tax debts, the probability of obtaining a permit in the future is almost zero,” said a GGL board member.
“If you have tax debts in Germany, you also risk being denied permits abroad. Licences that have already been granted can also be revoked.”
Overview
In 2022, egamingmonitor.com scanned more than 10,000 game-page URLs from 2,400 online casinos, identifying nearly 28,000 games from 621 unique studios (belonging to 496 supplier groups). How does this compare to 2021 and what are the implications for operators, platforms and studios alike?
8% more suppliers than last year
The supply side of our industry grew by 8% or 100 companies in 2022 vs 2021. There are now 1,405 suppliers in the gaming world, categorised at the top level into: studios, studio/aggregators, aggregators and others.
Note that there will be a delay between the time studios are launched and the time we discover their games on operator sites. Whilst around 70 new studios were launched for example (including studio/aggregators), we identified games from an extra 100 new studios in 2022. This is because some of the 100 studios will have launched back in 2020 or 2021, for example.
The relative percentage by type has remained fairly constant and so just under 50 new studios, for example, were launched last year – or nearly 70 if you include the hybrid studio/aggregators. A further 24 new aggregators or platform providers entered the market too, including platforms that were spun out as B2B businesses from existing operators.
In total, we found games from 621 unique studios over the 12 months (slightly more than the Dec 22 figure below as some studios may have closed or amalgamated during the period).
The top 10 Studio groups have 56% of all game tiles globally
When we look at which studios have the best game distribution across all pages of all operator sites in 2022, the top 10 groups take up more than half of all game tiles on operator game pages. Evolution Gaming tops the list with all its subsidiaries contributing to a massive 14% of all game space across casino sites globally.
Note that on the “% of gametiles” metric, the big groups Novomatic, IGT and 1X2Network sit just outside the top 10.
If you were to rank studio groups instead by the unique no. of casino sites each studio has access to, then the rankings would be similar except that Novomatic, IGT and 1X2Network would replace Inspired, Betsoft and Playson in the top 10. The difference is down to the penetration across sites: some studios may have access to more sites but others have more games per site and or more games across multiple subpages on sites.
Evolution Gaming tops the board on this second KPI too, with gaming content from the group found across 2081/2459, or 85% of all casino sites globally.
Supplier GroupNo. sites rankEvolution Gaming1Games Global2Pragmatic Play3Light & Wonder4Playtech5Play’n GO6IGT7Gauselmann Group81X2 Network9Novomatic10
Consolidation of content supply reaches 70%
This next chart gives a feel for the consolidation of studio content in our industry. Game content supplied by larger groups now accounts for 70% of all content on casino sites and the number is still rising. Yes, there were another 100 new studio entrants to the market last year but the share of the big incumbents continues to grow.
Note that games from ‘large groups’ here are defined as those produced by studios that either have subsidiaries or parent companies.
33% more games across casino sites vs 2021
We identify more than 25,000 unique games each month across operator sites, up 33% from this time last year. The sheer number of games found across operator sites has increased further – and for a handful of reasons:
a) operators do not tend to retire games
b) operators add more content studios each year either directly or via aggregators
c) aggregators add more studios to their portfolios each year (see later)
d) there are another 100 new studios this year producing content.
6,780 games were launched in 2022
Egamingmonitor adds more than 550 new games to the database each month from over 600 studios. The average studio launches just under one game per month.
Game production stats20222021Avg games launched per month565470Total studios with live games621512Avg games launched per studio per month0.910.92
Some studios are more prolific than others. Our table of top game producers by studio group (not studio brand as such) shows how 7 groups are launching more than 100 games per year. Note that this includes all game types including table games, instants, live games and so forth. Games Global’s family of studios tops the list in terms of output, closely followed by Spinomenal. Whilst a little less familiar, two studios which focus on offshore operators, Inbet Games and KA Gaming, are highly productive.
Supplier GroupNo. games produced 2022Games Global186Spinomenal178Pragmatic Play165Evolution Gaming155Playtech138KA Gaming136Skywind Group111Inbet Games94Light & Wonder93IGT86
There are more than 50 studio groups building at least two games per month, i.e. 25+ per annum, whilst the ‘median average’ is around 7 games per studio per year.
Slots make up 87.5% of all game content on operator pages
Across the 2,500 operator sites that we monitor, slots account for 87.5% of all game content across casino pages. Live games in the second spot account for around 5% of all game content on the page.
New game types such as slingo and crash games are making inroads yet are still dwarfed in numbers (the 55 crash games that exist, for example, are 0.1% of 43,000 total games on our database). Some of the more innovative games though, whilst taking up a very small % of total ‘shelf space’, are quite well distributed in terms of the number of sites where found. They also tend to be more prominent in the better page positions, i.e. nearer the top or in the new, featured or popular sections.
Operators now have games from 50 studios on their site on average
On average, operators have added another 14 studios worth of content this past year and now offer content from 50 suppliers. Note though that the median is around 35.
If each studio were to produce just under 1 game per month then the average number of new games that an operator could choose to launch each month would be around 45, or 1.5 new games every day. The fleeting nature of novelty is more evidence that the lifespan of games is shortening yet further.
Operator x game/studio stats20222021Avg games on an operator’s site650545Avg no. of studios on an operator’s site5036Games launched per month per operator*4539Any new game % of all new games on operator site2%3%Any new game % of total games on operator site0.2%0.2%Most studios per site257% of sites that have >100 studios16%
A handful of operators offer over 4,000 games on site
The largest operators in terms of breadth of game content include the likes of Videoslots.com plus sites licensed in Curacao by the likes of Altacore, Avento and Equinox. 16% of all operator sites offer games from more than 100 studios.
Meanwhile, there are also some operators who no longer add all content from all suppliers but instead focus on relevance and quality rather than quantity.
Starburst still no. 1 – the consolidated 2022 Chart…
In terms of distribution, Starburst still ranks no. 1 globally on our games Chart for 2022, and the game is found across 1,395 sites or 56% of the total. See our January dashboard for December’s chart. The groups Evolution Gaming, Pragmatic Play, Games Global and Play’n GO dominate the top 20 positions. Note that the chart below also includes non-slots content, with live games Crazy Time and Lightning Roulette also making it into the top 20. The top new games this past year were Bigger Bass Bonanza, Big Bass Splash and Gates of Olympus from Pragmatic Play plus Dynamite Riches Megaways from Red Tiger.
Game (Studio)RankStarburst (NetEnt)1Big Bass Bonanza (Pragmatic Play)2Book Of Dead (Play’n GO)3Lightning Roulette (Evolution Gaming)4Sweet Bonanza (Pragmatic Play)5Gates of Olympus (Pragmatic Play)6Bonanza (Big Time Gaming)7Wolf Gold (Pragmatic Play)8Bigger Bass Bonanza (Pragmatic Play)9Dynamite Riches Megaways (Red Tiger)10Gonzo’s Quest (NetEnt)11Gonzo’s Quest Megaways (Red Tiger)129 Masks Of Fire (Gameburger Studios)139 Pots Of Gold (Gameburger Studios)14The Dog House Megaways (Pragmatic Play)15Legacy Of Dead (Play’n GO)16Wild Wild Riches (Pragmatic Play)17Big Bass Splash (Pragmatic Play)18Crazy Time (Evolution Gaming)19Immortal Romance (Microgaming)20
Branded games are on the wane but high volatility Animals & Nature titles on the up!
It’s worth throwing out a few interesting stats relating to game features from 2022. Branded games are a smaller % of all game content this past year vs 2021, whilst Megaways are slightly up.
The top themes of 2022 were Action & Adventure, Tales & Legends and Animals & Nature. The themes Animals & Nature and Tales & Legends in particular, increased their share of game distribution globally.
The most popular game words in 2022 were: Hot, Fruit, Fortune, Dragon, Gold, Wild, Gods, Magic and Megaways.
And the winner of ‘Colour of the Year’ is… brown
Not exactly the most exciting tint perhaps, but brown is the colour that has increased its share most, across the billions of pixels of game-tiles out there!
Game feature stats20222021% Ways1.7%1.6%% using licensed third-party brands2.2%2.5%RTP95.3%95.4%Med vol %35.7%36.9%High vol %28.4%27.4%5 Reels %80.9%82.7%Action & Adventure10.5%10.3%Tales & Legends6.7%5.3%Animals & Nature5.3%4.1%Black34.3%34.6%Brown22.6%22.3%Silver11.8%11.9%
Top Dealmakers 2022
The aggregator 1Click Games was the busiest aggregator in 2022 in terms of integrating new content partners – one reason, perhaps, why they were recently acquired by crypto platform Lion Gaming. They struck deals with 27 studios in the year, well ahead of second and third place PariPlay and Relax Gaming. EveryMatrix remains the most ‘connected’ aggregation platform of all time with casino content sourced from a massive 217 studios.
The busiest studio over the last 12 months from a deals perspective was the live games supplier Beter, which managed to secure 6 distribution deals via aggregators. Apparat Gaming, CT Gaming, Lady Luck Games, Slotmill and Spribe were all close runners up.
And finally, originality is on trend! Only 11% of games launched in 2022 had the same name
A little-known fact: historically, 15% of all slot games have the same name as another. But there was an improvement this last year as just 11% of slot games launched shared names with an existing title. Football Fever was popular but it was another handful of “Cleopatra” games (adding to 9 that were already out there) that surprised us. Some studios are clearly hoping that a bit of that IGT royal shine rubs off.
Egamingmonitor.com cover 44,000 games, 1,400 suppliers and 2,400 operators. For access to our interactive charts and filters by country, by page type, by studio, by operator, by page type and more, please get in touch!
