Romania saw the highest such increase in the first year of the pandemic, followed by Portugal far behind (55%), Italy, Serbia and Lithuania (45% to 50% each), according to the same data collected by Vixio GamblingCompliance and other regulatory bodies.
When looking at the value of the online gambling and sports betting market, Romania is somewhere in the middle of the European ranking, behind countries like Italy, France, Sweden and Spain. People spend EUR2.5 billion a year on online betting in Italy, for instance, five times more than Romania.
These are only online figures, which are easier to track, and there also people who only use this channel.
The UEFA European Football Championship gave a boost to the industry in 2021. Superbet had more than 250,000 people spending EUR40 on average online that month.
“During the 2020 European Football Championship (June 11 – July 11) we had about 10 million tickets and more than 250,000 active players placing sports bets online. On average, each player spent EUR40 in the 30 days of the championship,” Superbet officials say.
A Superbet client usually spends EUR500 online a year, more than in 2017 or 2018, they added.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)