An Optimum Betting Market:
A Regulatory, Fiscal & Integrity Assessment
Produced by:
In partnership with:
The ten pillars of an optimum betting market
- Betting available through land-based and online channels
- Unlimited or market maximising licence numbers
- Licensing fees to reflect regulatory costs
- Robust but practical player protection measures
- Betting taxation in 15-20% GGR range
- No overly burdensome additional taxation
- Wide product offering - multiple channels: fixed odds, pool
- Wide product offering - permitted bets: no significant restrictions
- Betting integrity protocols
- Balanced advertising and sponsorship parameters
Key Findings
Of 650,000 sports events offered on average by IBIA members, 99.96% had no integrity issues. This translates into 1 betting alert for every 2,700 sporting events.
Up to 99% of betting turnover is wagered on markets that are also available pre-match, negating any supposed integrity benefit from prohibiting in-play betting on regulated markets.
In football, 9 out of 10 (91%) of all IBIA alerts took place on primary betting markets. With only one suspicious alert on secondary markets for every $2.2bn of turnover.
Over 50% of betting alerts from IBIA members in tennis were on match or sets, with only 5% of alerts on points only betting.
92% of basketball and 84% of football alerts from IBIA members were generated by customers in a different country to the potentially corrupted match, thereby circumventing any betting restrictions.
The top seven football competitions account for less than 25% of total regulated betting turnover globally, with $110bn wagered on matches outside of these main leagues.
1 in 5 of all suspicious betting alerts in football involve reports from IBIA members’ retail outlets, evidence that this is not an issue that can be considered exclusive to online.
The global regulated betting industry loses around $25m per annum from match-fixing.
The global betting market
Global Betting Turnover and Gross Win 2012-25e (US$bn)
Betting is a high turnover, low margin business. The global regulated market generated $74.1bn of gross win in 2019 (from c.$490bn in turnover), which is forecast to increase to $105.7bn by 2025e (from c.$770bn in turnover). This represented 16% of all gambling gross win in 2019. However, betting is the fastest growing gambling segment and is forecast to grow at over double the rate of the overall gambling industry over the next five years.
Split of Global Sports Betting Gross Win % by Sport 2019 & 2025e
Total Betting Gross Win % by Continent 2019-25e
Global Pre-Match vs In-Play Online Sports Betting Gross Win % 2012-25e
The availability of betting and the cost of match-fixing
Operators who contributed to this report offered betting on over
500,000
sports matches on
average per year
650,000
events including
horse racing
99.96%
had no suspicious
betting alerts
identified by IBIA
members
91% of all football alerts identified by IBIA members between 2017 and 2020 took place on primary betting markets (e.g., full time result/number of goals) compared to secondary markets (e.g., corners, yellow cards)
wagered on secondary markets
in football with only 5 alerts on
average during 2017 – 2020
$107bn
global football betting turnover on in-play betting
62%
of football alerts and potential corrupt activity identified by IBIA members can be attributed (in part or full) to pre-match betting activity
74%
of all global football betting turnover now placed on in-play markets
38%
of football alerts and potential corrupt activity identified by IBIA members is solely attributed to in-play betting
The evaluation of the cost of match-fixing has been based on an analysis of related data supplied by regulated operators, who monitor and report suspicious betting activity via IBIA and, as such, are well-placed to provide a strong data set. The impact of match-fixing on the wider regulated betting sector has also been factored in. The subsequent assessment has therefore focused solely on the regulated industry (any losses incurred by unregulated and unlicensed operators in theory do not constitute a cost to the regulated sector).
