Italy’s overall sports betting market took in wagers of €562.4m in the month of May, 15% higher than the same month last year. For the year to date, sports betting turnover totaled €2.9b, up from €2.5b in the first five months of 2015, with online wagering accounting for €1.6b of 2016’s total.
Total online wagers in May were up nearly one-third to €317.4m. Bet365 claimed just under €120m of this pie for a 37.1% share, a 1.4-point improvement over its Q1 share. Bet365’s total was also sufficient to make it the top overall betting operator, easily eclipsing SNAI-Cogetech’s combined online/retail total of €80m.
Gala Coral Group’s Eurobet brand placed a distant second on the online chart with €32m, well ahead of third-ranked SISAL’s €23.9m, while SNAI’s €21.5m edged out William Hill by a mere €200k.
SNAI-Cogetech was the unquestioned retail betting leader with €58.4m, while Lottomatica ranked second with €41.4m with Eurobet not far behind at €39.5m.
Virtual betting products had a strong May with wagers totaling €95.3m, the second highest total this year behind January. Betting exchanges were only approved in Italy in 2014, but this year has shown strong growth, albeit from a relatively small base. Exchange wagers totaled only around €400k in May but the year-to-date number is up more than one-third over the first five months of 2015.