The report from the Serviço de Regulação e Inspeção de Jogos (SRIJ) and reported by NM, which analyses gaming activity in Portugal, revealed in the third quarter of 2023, across the 17 operating entities, the number of player registrations stood at 3,923.5 thousand, 2.8 percent more compared to the previous quarter.
Between July and September 2023, online gaming and betting activity generated around €215.3 million in gross revenue, €9.4 million more compared to the previous quarter.
“This value resulted from the increase of €11.5 million observed in games of chance (+9.4 percent) and the decrease of €2.1 million in gross revenue from sports bets (-2.5 percent)”, reads the document published on the SRIJ website.
In comparison to the same period in 2022, there was an increase in gross revenue of €57 million (+36 percent), as a result of the increase observed in both games of chance and in sports bets (€44.8 million and €12.3 million, respectively).
In the period under analysis, the value of bets on games of chance was €3,646.7 million, a 47.2 percent increase compared to the same period in 2022, and 12.5 percent more compared to the second quarter of 2023.
Bets on Machine Games represented 82.3 percent of total bets on online games of chance.
Regarding the registration of new players, the report indicates that 81.6 percent we under the age of 45, of which 32.5 percent were aged between 18 and 24.
The districts of Porto and Lisbon are those with the highest concentration of players (21.2 percent and 20.7 percent, respectively), followed by the districts of Braga, Setúbal and Aveiro, which account for 25 percent of the total number of registered players.
On September 30, 2023, across all operating entities, 196.6 thousand player registrations were self-excluded from online gambling and betting (15 thousand more than on June 30, 2023).
The ratio of self-exclusions to the number of player registrations at the end of the third quarter of 2023 was 5.0 percent.
Regarding gambling activities in casinos, slot machines and bingo halls generated in the third quarter of 2023, around €76.1 million in gross revenue, representing an increase of 14 percent compared to the previous quarter, and a growth of 7.8 percent in comparison to the same period in 2022.
“The increase in bank gambling and gambling on automatic machines contributed greatly to this growth, 23.64 percent and 75.12 percent, respectively, which totals around 98.76 percent of the total gross revenue”, reads the report.
The Online Gaming and Betting Legal Regime was established on June 29, 2015, until September 30, 2023, since then, 1,172 notifications were sent to illegal online gaming operators to end their activity in Portugal.