Online gaming is a huge market in Sweden, and it has even greater potential. Mediavision decided to develop its own estimate of how large the online gaming market really is in the country. What it found is that up to 230,000 Swedes are gambling online every month. This has made them the target of international operators, making the Swedish market very competitive.
Television Advertising
In Sweden, Mediavision found that 27 online casinos advertised their brands on TV in the first three months of 2017. IGaming was a huge advertiser. These advertising campaigns resulted in excellent results for online casinos. Betson and Unibet reported 50,000 new customers out of the Swedish market during the first quarter from these campaigns. This means that an already $1.9 billion market is growing.
Gray Market Operators
Something to keep in mind is that Swedish gamers are able to play on unlicensed websites that are operated on the gray market. Foreign operators generated $576.1 million last year from Swedish players. When the market is unregulated, it is difficult to determine exactly how much money is being spent. This means the money spent by Swedish online gamers could be much greater than what is estimated.
The Swedish government is cracking down on gray market online casinos by making them unavailable to players. In other words, regulations are about to become much stricter. In addition, operators that are approved to operate in Sweden will have to pay a tax of 18% of their total gaming revenue. It is believed once the online casinos are regulated, Swedish players will be more likely to play games on licensed casinos. The new regulations are expected to go into effect on Jan. 1, 2019.
If this occurs, Sweden will join Denmark in regulating the casino gaming market. Denmark’s decision was a very positive step for its online gambling industry. Other countries, like Norway and Finland, may not follow Sweden and Denmark anytime soon because they appear to be OK with their monopoly systems.